Bye Aerospace eFlyer
Bye Aerospace is working with Oxis on the Li-S battery cell characteristics to improve its 4 eFlyer. Credit: OXIS Energy.

OXIS Energy is set to produce a Lithium-Sulfur (Li-S) battery cell for the high-voltage battery pack system to be considered for Bye Aerospace’s future electric aircraft.

The Li-S advanced battery cell is expected to create significant benefits to the aviation industry.

OXIS Energy CEO Huw Hampson-Jones said: “Aviation is one of OXIS’ target markets, and in the first instance, Regional Rapid Air Taxi Transportation. A key measure of OXIS’ suitability is to be able to consistently produce cells in excess of 400Wh/kg, which are already undergoing evaluation.

“OXIS expects to achieve 500Wh/kg by early 2020. Our Li-S cells and battery systems are ideally suited for aviation.

“They are over 50% lighter than the current Li-ion cell and battery systems, with the winning formula of a high energy cell at the power required. The use of the same cell format across batteries will also help our customers to minimise cost and improve serviceability.”

OXIS expects to start the project next month.

As part of the ground tests conducted in Europe, OXIS has demonstrated that Li-S showed a significant improvement in simulated flight duration when compared to Lithium NMC.

The company plans to conduct further tests to provide a robust indication of the Li-S performance.

Bye Aerospace CEO George Bye said: “New Li-S battery cells from Oxis have the potential to greatly enhance the quality, cost and performance of eFlyer 4 and our other future aircraft projects.

“Bye Aerospace is working with Oxis on the Li-S battery cell characteristics to significantly improve our eFlyer 4 and future air taxi aircraft designs’ performance. The average age of the global market for Turboprop fleet is 28 years.”

For the next 18 months, OXIS aims to move towards the production of commercial cells and battery systems so as to meet the volumes set by Bye Aerospace.