$15m for train, plane and ship electric motors research

Nearly $15 million has been awarded to Victoria University of Wellington’s Robinson Research Institute for a project on high-power electric motors for large-scale transport such as planes, trains and ships.

The funding from the Ministry for Business, Innovation and Employment (MBIE) is across seven years to enable the institute to work with project partners to draw on New Zealand’s world-leading expertise in superconductor engineering and power electronics.

It is one of just three projects funded by MBIE under the Strategic Science Investment Fund.

The programme has four workstreams – superconducting machines, cryogenic systems, power electronics, and training and education, institute deputy director and principal engineer Dr Rod Badcock says.

The pressing need to keep the world moving while massively reducing global carbon emissions provides the impetus for this work, he says.

Currently, 96% of the world’s transportation energy comes from fossil fuels, making it a major target for decarbonisation. Transport represents about one-third of global energy use.

“Reducing global carbon emissions from heavy freight and passenger transport requires the switch to electric propulsion for rail, shipping and aviation,” Badcock says.

“But these applications require new high-power, lightweight motors which are beyond existing technologies.”

He says New Zealand’s economy is heavily dependent on aviation and – as the current global situation shows – is highly exposed to any limitations in international travel.

“It is widely recognised that superconducting machines offer the only feasible route to realising large-scale hybrid electric aircraft,” Badcock adds.

“Aviation poses perhaps the biggest challenge of all, as entirely new technology must be developed and deployed within a strict regulatory regime.”

Badcock says the Institute will develop key components for these high-power, lightweight and fully superconducting motors.

This programme will enable industry to exploit the technology in New Zealand, create skilled people for a high-value workforce, and facilitate a high-value export market in the electrification of transport.

“This programme of work will make a significant contribution to the emerging international effort to develop large-scale hybrid electric aircraft.

It will also focus on ancillary subsystems, including the development of new capability in the design and prototyping of high-performance cryocoolers and heat exchangers.

A cryocooler is a specific type of refrigerator that allows the extremely low temperatures (minus 220 degrees Celsius) required by superconductors to be reached.

The institute, along with its partners, has also received $11.6 million from the Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment for a programme developing ion thrusters incorporating superconductor magnets on spacecraft.

Powered by solar cells, and with the use of superconductors, the new thrusters will be more powerful for their weight and revolutionise space technology.