Hawthorne-based Ampaire Inc. has notched impressive flight tests and snagged some significant contracts in recent months as it races against a growing field of competitors to become the first company to get federal certification to operate hybrid-electric aircraft on real-world flights.
Last summer, Ampaire’s test hybrid-electric plane racked up 1,135 miles in a single nonstop flight, shattering the record for distance traveled by a plane – of any size or make – with an electric motor. The company claims to have held the previous record of 341 miles, set in 2020.
And over the past year, Ampaire has bagged three contracts that cumulatively call for the company to convert 56 Cessna Grand Caravan aircraft to hybrid-electric powertrains, with future options for the conversion of 225 more.
Despite these gains, the company has been forced to push back a year to 2025 its target date for obtaining Federal Aviation Administration certification for its hybrid-electric aircraft powertrain technology. Ampaire Chief Executive Kevin Noertker cited difficulties in obtaining sufficient financing to keep up the rigorous flight test pace necessary for certification.
Yet Noertker is undeterred, sticking with the strategy of aiming to be the first aviation company in the world to achieve full operational status for aircraft outfitted with electric motors.
Most practical tech
Ampaire was founded in 2016 by Noertker and another former aviation industry executive, Cory Combs, with the aim of pursuing hybrid-electric technology as the quickest way to bring aircraft with electric motors into service, much as Toyota Motor Corp.’s Prius was the first hybrid-electric ground-based vehicle to gain widespread traction at the turn of this century.
“We are entering the market with the Prius approach,” Noertker said. “In the next decade, this will be the only practical approach to decarbonized air travel ready for commercial use.”
The technology pairs an electric battery pack that’s located in the cargo hold with the standard internal combustion engine that runs on jet fuel. Both the battery pack and the conventional engine are engaged at full power during takeoff. At cruising altitude, both the battery and electric motor operate at partial power levels.
But there is one key difference: the Prius was designed as a hybrid-electric vehicle, while Ampaire essentially retools existing aircraft –primarily 9-seat Cessna Grand Cavarans and 6-seat Cessna 337 Skymasters.
Overall, the company claims its retrofitted hybrid-electric planes use as much as 70% less fuel than their conventional counterparts – and lower emissions by as much as 90% if using jet fuel derived from sustainable sources.
But hybrid aircraft still use jet fuel that emits carbon, both in production and in flight. Fully-electric aircraft, however, do not emit any carbon in flight, which is why, until very recently, most of the attention in the decarbonized air travel market has been on the developers of fully electric aircraft, some with vertical takeoff and landing capability.
One such company is Santa Cruz-based Joby Aviation Inc.
But fully electric aircraft have range and weight limitations that have become increasingly apparent in the last few years, according to Marty Bradley, an aerospace industry veteran-turned consultant who is also an adjunct professor in aerospace and mechanical engineering at the USC Viterbi School of Engineering. Most of the batteries that are now being tested for all-electric aircraft have a maximum range of 150 to 200 miles between charges, he said.
For the Southern California market, that means mostly short-hop regional trips, such as from Santa Monica to Palm Springs.
Another drawback: The batteries are heavy – exactly the opposite of what’s needed to achieve maximum aircraft lift – and take up lots of space that could otherwise be used to carry passengers or payloads.
On another front, hydrogen fuel is also being explored as a path toward decarbonized air travel. For example, Hawthorne-based Universal Hydrogen Co. is testing hydrogen fuel cell retrofits to regional general aviation aircraft that could conceivably rival Ampaire’s hybrid electric battery retrofits in range. In March, Universal Hydrogen announced it had completed testing of a 40-seat regional aircraft outfitted with one of its fuel cells.
But Bradley said in order for hydrogen fuel cells to be adopted on a widespread basis, much more hydrogen fuel infrastructure needs to be installed at regional and municipal airports.
One more technology is also being tested: Sustainable aviation fuel, which is jet fuel made from sustainable sources, such as biomass, wood chips and municipal waste streams. But, while sustainable aviation fuel has a much lower carbon footprint than conventionally generated aviation fuel, it is not zero-emission. And significant investment will be needed to scale up the the infrastructure necessary to divert these renewable sources to the production of jet fuel.
Hybrid-electric rivals
For the first few years of Ampaire’s existence, co-founders Nortker and Combs had the hybrid-electric market pretty much to themselves. But that has changed rapidly as companies developing all-electric aircraft power train technologies have encountered barriers, Bradley said.
Among the recent entrants: Redmond, Washington-based MagniX, which has a partnership with Hawthorne-based Surf Air Mobility Corp.; Ajdovscina, Slovenia-based Pipistrel, which was acquired last year by Providence, Rhode Island-based Textron Aviation; and Daytona Beach, Fla.-based VerdeGo Aero.
MagniX in September 2021 beat out Ampaire for a $74 million NASA contract to speed development of electric propulsion systems for aircraft; that’s more than twice the financial resources that Ampaire can bring to bear. And Pipistrel now has access to Textron’s huge revenue base, which approached $12.9 billion last year.
Funding difficulties
That puts Ampaire at a distinct financial disadvantage as it races to complete the testing regimen to win FAA certification.
Noertker said that with private capital markets tight over the last couple years, the company has turned increasingly to government contracts to fund development and deployment of its hybrid-electric technology.
But while MagniX snagged that $74 million NASA contract, Ampaire has so far had to settle for much smaller contracts, including a $9 million award from the Department of Energy’s advanced research unit and a $150,000 award under NASA’s Small Business Innovative Research program.
The difficulty with government contracts, Noertker said, is that they tend to operate on a slower timetable, which is one of the factors behind the one-year delay in the expected date for FAA certification to 2025.
He said Ampaire is now preparing for another round of funding through the capital markets, but that the market is not ideal.
“High interest rates are definitely a barrier here,” he said.
In all, between government and industry contracts and private capital, Noertker said Ampaire would need between $30 million and $50 million in additional funds to complete the testing for FAA certification.
Aviation contracts
Ampaire has had some success in securing contracts with aviation companies.
In January, Ampaire won a contract for six converted Cessna Grand Caravan planes operated by Jundiai, Brazil’s Azul Conecta regional air carrier.
That followed a larger contract with Temecula-based Personal Airline Exchange Inc., dba WingTips, for conversion of 25 Cessna Grand Caravan aircraft with the potential for an additional 200 conversions, and another agreement with London-based decarbonized aviation finance company Monte Aircraft Leasing for the purchase of 25 converted aircraft.
Noertker said he could not disclose the value of each of these contracts. He did say, however, that the company has received to date about $22 million in contracts, mostly on the government side.
For the Brazil contract, Noertker said Ampaire intends to pursue certification from Brazilian aviation authorities immediately following the achievement of FAA certification.
Bradley said Ampaire’s pursuit of international contracts concurrently with domestic contracts is a sound strategy.
“I think the international market it is more promising, especially in Europe with shorter flights with extreme emphasis on environmental benefits,” he said.
Bradley was a bit more cautious about whether Ampaire would be the first to market with hybrid-electric aircraft. He said that while the company has a sizeable lead now, its competitors are quickly catching up, thanks in large part to their deeper pockets.
But Noertker remained confident.
“We believe we’ve flown more hours and miles with hybrid electric planes than anyone else in world,” he said. “We have the strongest technical foundation.”
