Taking off on the wings of an electric dream

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Aviation accounts for about 2.5% of the total carbon dioxide emissions globally. While the number may seem small, the industry’s climate influence is much larger, considering the non-CO2 emissions induced by jet engine heating. The combined emissions together add to the global warming effect.

That’s not all. Given the rising number of flyers and the growth in the industry, it is estimated that by 2050 the commercial aircraft emissions could almost triple. 

Bengaluru and Norway-based clean-tech start-up SiriNor proposes a solution to this – emission-free electric jet engines. Co-founded by Abhijeet Inamdar and Lars Erik Robertsen in 2021, SiriNor aims to make aviation emission-free by developing the world’s first electric jet turbines. 

SiriNor’s engine design which works on electric propulsion concept would neither have a combustion chamber nor would it require super alloys. According to the team, the energy source would be mostly Hydrogen and fuel cells. 

A non-polluting solution

“Jet engines historically have been combustion-based and continue to be so today,” says Abhijeet Inamdar, co-founder at SiriNor. 

While 70% of the aviation emission is carbon dioxide, a variety of other gases and particulate matter are also emitted by aircraft adding to the warming effect.  

These include water vapour, nitrous gases, hydrocarbons, soot, and sulfates.  

While the conversations on emissions from the aviation industry so far have mostly been around reducing CO2 emissions, Inamdar notes that emerging start-ups in the space such as SiriNor aim to create more awareness around non-CO2 emissions which has a big influence on total warming effect.  

“In combustion engines, the temperature goes up to around 1,500 degrees Celsius resulting in non-CO2 emissions. For our engine the temperature would only go up to 400 degrees Celsius,” he points out.  

“We don’t need super alloys. Instead, we would use materials such as steel, aluminium, titanium or alloys of aluminium. We have mapped out all the supply chain in India, so there wouldn’t be a lot of reliance on global supply chains,” he further adds. 

Less carbon, less costs

So, how much less emission are we looking at if all existing jet engines get replaced by electric engines? 

According to IATA figures, the combustion of 1 kg of jet fuel in an aircraft engine produces 3.16kg of CO2 and could vary based on several factors including the distance travelled, the load, weather conditions and efficiency of the aircraft.

“If a jet engine flies 3,000 km, it emits around 25 tons of CO2. The non-CO2 emissions are on top of that. Whereas for us, it’s zero,” Inamdar points out. 

In 2019 aviation emitted around 1 billion tons of CO2. As per the International Energy Agency, aviation emissions in 2022 reached 80% of the pre-pandemic levels.

“Even if you capture 20% of that, you are still talking about preventing 200 million tons of CO2 emissions,” he remarks.

According to Inamdar electric engine adds value from the cost perspective also. 

For example, in European Union measures such as carbon tax per ton of CO2 emission have been proposed for aviation industry. Replacing combustion engines with electric ones could hence help save tax money, he points out.

“For electric jet engines, the biggest advantage apart from zero emissions is that we can reduce costs by at least 30% compared to the existing jet engines. This is because in electric engines temperature doesn’t go above 400 degrees. The metallurgy is hence cheaper and easily available,” he adds. 

The journey

While the start-up was officially registered in 2021, the talks began in 2020, recollects Inamdar.

His wife had been diagnosed with stage-4 cancer and Inamdar had taken a break from his corporate life to spend more time with her.

It was around the same time Robertsen (co-founder of SiriNor) approached him with the idea of designing electric jet engines for supersonic speeds. The idea struck a chord and there was a reason. 

The couple, who was based out of U.S. then, wanted to visit their families in India and Thailand; However, the doctors advised against it owing to the long journey and travel time. 

“Therefore, the idea of supersonic flights which travel much faster struck a chord with me. When I told my wife about it, she laughed,” recollects Inamdar who has a penchant for travelling and dreams of visiting every country someday.  

In March 2021, his wife passed away. Refusing to go back to corporate life, he pursued his start-up journey, moved to India, and named the new venture after his wife, Siri. 

Multiple applications

The start-up, which is currently in its seed stage, completed its feasibility study with IISc in 2022-23, and built and tested an electric propulsion system. It has been part of a Shell accelerator programme and is currently working on building its working prototype. 

According to the team, one of the first use cases for the engine would be large surveillance drones such as those used by defence.  

“Large surveillance drones currently use jet fuel which has emissions and are not made in India. In our case, it’s almost 90% made in India. Hence, we can control the cost and sell to the world from India,” says Inamdar. The total drone market is currently around $25 billion, and large drones would be around 15% of that. 

The second application would be ground effect vehicles or seaplanes, whose market size is estimated to be around $20 billion by 2030. 

“That is an emerging market for island-to-island connectivity, offshore rigs, and anything offshore or marine. For going offshore currently boats or helicopters are used and again jet fuel or kerosene comes into the picture. If they can use electric, hydrogen or fuel cells through our engines, two problems can be solved – 1. They can go faster as it’s five times faster than boats 2. No emissions,” says Inamdar. 

Long-distance market 

“Aviation comes after that and we would be looking to start with narrow-body private jets,” he adds. The jet engine market for aviation is expected to touch $100 billion by 2030. 

“The electric jet engine market will be around 10% of that. Even if we capture 1% of that, it is huge revenue,” notes an optimistic Inamdar. 

According to him, the company would be looking to tap into the above-1000km and up to 4000 km long distance market eventually. 

“That’s all the flights within India, within the U.S., and most of Europe. Around 60% of the market is within that range.”