Massachusetts startup Alaka’i has designed a flying car that the company touts as the “first air mobility vehicle powered by hydrogen fuel cells”. On their promotion video, they announced that this flying car has ten times the power of conventional lithium batteries without compromising on carbon emissions.
The hydrogen fuel cells give the five-passenger Skai a maximum range of 400 miles (640 km) with a flight time of up to four hours.
The company has been working on the design for four years and is hoping to receive Federal Aviation Administration certification before the end of 2020.
Six rotors enable vertical take-off and landing, enabling the vehicle to essentially fly like a massive drone. An “Airframe Parachute” ensures that the Skai doesn’t simply drop out of the air in the case of a propeller failure.
Not taxi yet
But Skai remains an ambitious dream until Alaka’i receives all the relevant government and regulatory approvals. And then there’s the fact that hydrogen fuel is pretty hard to come by in most parts of the world.
CEO Stephan Hanvey admitted that it could take another ten years until flying cars become practical to ferry passengers from city to city in an interview with the Associated Press.
But it’s an exciting prospect and a potential alternative to the limitations of current-state lithium batteries that could enable flying cars to cover a lot more ground — if hydrogen as a fuel source ever takes off…
A reformed methanol fuel cell using renewable methanol would probably give it a rang of over 900 miles.
Marcel