EVTOL battery analysis reveals unique operating demands. Researchers at the Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory are taking cleaner transportation to the skies by creating and evaluating new batteries for airborne electric vehicles that take off and land vertically.
These aircraft, commonly called eVTOLs, range from delivery drones to urban air taxis. They are designed to rise into the air like a helicopter and fly using wing-borne lift like an airplane. Compared with helicopters, eVTOLs generally use more rotors spinning at a lower speed, making them both safer and quieter.
The airborne EV’s aren’t just flying cars, and ORNL researchers conclude that eVTOL batteries can’t just be adapted from electric car batteries. So far that has been the dominant approach to the technology, which is mostly in the modeling stage. ORNL researchers took a different tack by evaluating how lithium-ion batteries fare under extremely high power draw.
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