AIRVENTURE 2012 – ELECTRIC AVIATION EVENTS

The Lindbergh Foundation, through its Aviation Green Alliance and the Electric Aircraft Development Alliance, is pleased to announce the following electric aviation events at AirVenture 2012:
• Electric Flight Symposium, co-sponsored with AeroInnovate and EAA
• Lindbergh Prize
• Electric Aircraft Development Alliance meeting

ELECTRIC FLIGHT SYMPOSIUM
From the people who hold the keys to the vaults of knowledge at NASA, DOE and the Air Force to the entrepreneurs and visionaries creating tomorrow’s breakthrough electric aircraft, this year’s Electric Flight Symposium will inform, engage and entertain AirVenture attendees with a wide range of compelling presentations.

Michael Dudley from the NASA Aeronautics Research Institute will describe NASA’s program to make deliberate investments in innovative, early stage and potentially revolutionary aviation concepts and technologies.  Dr. Donald Hillebrand from Argonne National Labs will speak about bringing the costs of electric vehicle technology and components into parity with fossil fuel powered vehicles and deliver an insider’s report on electric battery development. Dr. Mark Maybury will share his unique perspective on the future of flight as the Chief Scientist of the Air Force.  NASA Innovator and Puffin designer, Mark Moore will bring the audience into the future of wind energy and personal air vehicles. Robert Araujo will speak about sustainable manufacturing and green technology initiatives at Sikorsky.

New this year is an Ignite Presentation during which electric aircraft innovators will present brief descriptions of their latest technologies. Speakers include electric motorcycle pioneer Chip Yates who will share his plans for the Flight of the Century – using today’s technology to retrace Charles Lindbergh’s historic 1927 New York to Paris flight in an electric aircraft. Alexander Zosel of e-volo (Lindbergh Prize winner at Aero 2012) will electrify the audience with a never before seen animated James Bond action video featuring a volocopter. John McGinnis of Synergy Aircraft will describe his successful kickstarter campaign and Synergy’s unique double box tail.

The Lindbergh Foundation’s Aviation Green Alliance, in partnership with AeroInnovate and EAA, is excited to present the 2012 Electric Flight Symposium. The Symposium brings together experts in the field of electric flight to discuss the vision for the future as well as breakthrough technologies. Both sessions will have time for audience participation.

The Symposium will be held in Innovations Hangar North and is open to all AirVenture visitors. Below is the Symposium schedule and a list of confirmed speakers with biographies. Updates will be posted to www.aviationgreen.com.

Thursday, July 26 – Future Visions
9:00 Welcome
9:15 John L. Petersen, Futurist and Founder, The Arlington Institute
9:40 Robert Araujo, Manager – Sustainable Development, Sikorsky
10:05 Dr. Mark Maybury, Chief Scientist, U.S. Air Force
10:30 Discussion and Break
10:50 Dr. Morton Grosser, President MG Consulting; Gossamer Albatross team member and author of Gossamer Odyssey: The Triumph of Human-Powered Flight
11:15 Chip Yates, Founder and CEO, Flight of the Century
11:40 Discussion
11:55 Michael Dudley, Director, NASA Aeronautics Research Institute
12: 20 Dr. Don Hillebrand, Director, Center for Transportation Research, Argonne National Labs
12:45 Discussion and Closing

EADA will hold a meeting immediately following the Thursday session – see below.

Friday, July 27 – Breakthrough Technologies
9:00 Welcome
9:20 Mark Moore, Scientist, NASA Langley Research Center
9:45 Dr. Don Hillebrand, Director, Center for Transportation Research, Argonne National Labs
10:10 Discussion and Break
10:30 Ignite Presentation of Electric Aircraft Entrepreneurs
o Chip Yates, Flight of the Century
o Alexander Zosel, e-volo
o Jeremy Monnett, Sonex
o Embry Riddle Aeronautical University
o John McGinnis, Synergy
o Paul Petersen, Volta Volare

12:00 Discussion
12:30 Lindbergh Prize Award Presentation
12:45 Closing

LINDBERGH PRIZE
The tenth Lindbergh Prize will be awarded on Friday, July 27 at the Electric Flight Symposium. The Lindbergh Prizes are part of the LEAP Electric Flight Program, a Lindbergh Foundation program which is accelerating the development of the electric aircraft industry through a range of activities, from prizes to advocacy. Prior prizes have been awarded in the U.S. and in Europe for Innovation, Outstanding Achievement, Best Electric Aircraft and Quietest Aircraft.

ELECTRIC AIRCRAFT DEVELOPMENT ALLIANCE MEETING
EADA will hold its next meeting on Thursday, July 26 at 1:00 pm in Innovations Hangar North. All interested parties are welcome to attend. An agenda will be posted in the near future.
Pre-registration is not required for the Symposium or the EADA meeting, and there is no charge to attend. If you have questions about the Symposium or the EADA meeting, please contact Yolanka Wulff, Executive Director of the Lindbergh Foundation, at ywulff@lindberghfoundation.org.

 

SYMPOSIUM SPEAKER BIOGRAPHIES
Robert J. Araujo is the Manager of Sustainable Development and Environmental Health and Safety Programs for Sikorsky Aircraft Corporation and responsible for developing a sustainable approach to manufacturing systems and programs. Prior to this, he served as Manager of Environmental Engineering for Sikorsky. According to Mr. Araujo, Sikorsky has been employing a comprehensive strategy for environmental management and sustainability to lead the rotorcraft industry in reducing energy consumption, protecting natural resources, and being a leader in sustainable initiatives and green technology.
Michael Dudley is Director (acting) of the NASA Aeronautics Research Institute (NARI). NARI’s mission is to establish and maintain a collaborative government, industry, and academia work environment with the aid of network based virtual conferencing technologies. This enables NASA Aeronautics Mission Directorate innovative seedling concepts for aviation to be developed through collaborative research activities. Successful concepts will help guide future NASA aeronautics research and generate new technologies.
Dr. Morton Grosser is a technology consultant and venture capital investor in Menlo Park, CA. He received 2 engineering degrees from M.I.T, a Ph.D. from Stanford and was a National Institutes of Health Postdoctoral fellow at UCLA Medical Center. Dr. Grosser has been Director of the Boeing Scientific Research Laboratories and 7 corporations. He’s written 8 books and more than 100 scientific and engineering papers and has 11 patents issued or pending. Notable: Dr. Grosser was a Gossamer Albatross team member with Dr. Paul MacCready (often referred to as the father of human powered flight and founder of AeroVironment) and wrote about the experience in Gossamer Odyssey: The Triumph of Human-Powered Flight.
Donald G. Hillebrand is the Director of the Center for Transportation Research at Argonne National Laboratory. He leads Argonne National Lab’s Transportation activities including Vehicle Systems and Hybrid Vehicle Development, Engine and Emissions Research, Material Research, Tribology, Thermal, and Life Cycle and Economic Analysis. Dr. Hillebrand is also the Section Manager of Transportation Technologies. In this position, he leads the Vehicle Systems Section of Argonne National Lab’s Center for Transportation Research. He leads the three groups that are responsible for advanced vehicle testing and evaluation, modeling and systems analysis, and hardware-in-the-loop development of hydrogen technologies.
Dr. Mark T. Maybury is Chief Scientist of the U.S. Air Force, Washington, D.C. He serves as chief scientific adviser to the Chief of Staff and Secretary of the Air Force, and provides assessments on a wide range of scientific and technical issues affecting the Air Force mission. In this role he identifies and analyzes technical issues and brings them to attention of Air Force leaders, and interacts with other Air Staff principals, operational commanders, combatant commands, acquisition, and science and technology communities to address cross-organizational technical issues and solutions. He also interacts with other services and the Office of the Secretary of Defense on issues affecting the Air Force in-house technical enterprise. He serves on the Steering Committee and Senior Review Group of the Air Force Scientific Advisory Board, or SAB. He also is the principal science and technology representative of the Air Force to the civilian scientific and engineering community and to the public at large.
Mark Moore performs conceptual design system studies of advanced concepts at NASA Langley Research Center. He has a Bachelor’s degree in aerospace engineering from the University of Cincinnati, a Master’s degree in Aeronautical Engineering from Stanford University, and is completing his PhD in Aerospace System Design at Georgia Tech. He has worked for NASA performing conceptual design studies of advanced aircraft concepts for 25 years, with a focus on small powered-lift Personal and Unmanned Air Vehicles. He was the Manager of the NASA Vehicle Systems Program Personal Air Vehicle Sector, and currently specializes in electric propulsion synergistic integration in cooperative research with DARPA.
John L. Petersen is the President and Founder of The Arlington Institute. A provocative speaker, Mr. Petersen is considered by many to be one of the most informed futurists in the world. He is best-known for writing and thinking about high impact surprises—wild cards—and the process of surprise anticipation. His current professional involvements include the development of sophisticated tools for anticipatory analysis and surprise anticipation, long-range strategic planning and helping leadership design new approaches for dealing with the future. Mr. Petersen was a naval flight officer in the U.S. Navy and Navy Reserve and is a decorated veteran of both the Vietnam and Persian Gulf wars. In his spare time, Mr. Petersen built a Lancair IV-P.
Chip Yates is the Chief Executive Officer and Founder of Flight of the Century. Mr. Yates led a team of three volunteer aerospace engineers to create a 258 horsepower electric superbike which he rode at speeds over 200mph to eight official World Landspeed Records, the Pikes Peak International Hill Climb World Record, Four AMA National Records and Four AMA National Championship Titles. He currently holds the official FIM and Guinness Book of World Records™ titles for “The World’s Fastest Electric Motorcycle”. He has now installed the same 258 horsepower motor into “the world’s most powerful electric aircraft,” a Burt Rutan designed Long EZ. Yates is a prolific inventor, with more than 8 issued patents including 3 on the Jeep Grand Cherokee, and more than 30 consumer products invented and brought to market including the trendsetting “Fliplash” flip-over toy car that Yates invented, prototyped, and brought to market. Yates also invented, patented and brought to market the world’s first dual-chambered fitness bottle, SWIGZ®.

e-Genius wins Lindbergh Prize for Quietest Aircraft

The e-Genius team, with Erik Lindbergh and Yolanka Wulff of LEAP, winning the Lindbergh Prize for Quietest Aircraft

Erik Lindbergh, founder of LEAP, announced the first winner of the Lindbergh Prize for Quietest Aircraft at the NASA Green Flight Challenge. The prize was awarded to e-Genius, a two-seat electric airplane piloted by team leader Eric Raymond and Klaus Ohlmann. The plane was designed and built by University of Stuttgart Institute of Aircraft Design under the direction of Professor Rudolf Voit-Nitschmann and his assistants Len Schumann and Steffen Geinitz. Take off noise levels of the competitors ranged from a minimum of 56dBA to a maximum of 72dBA. e-Genius won with a takeoff range of 56 – 62dBA. By comparison, the takeoff noise of a turbo-fan aircraft at a similar distance is 110dBA, over 16 times louder.

For a full press release, click here.

e-Genius takes off at NASA Green Flight Challenge in Santa Rosa, CA

~ by Yolanka

Electric Planes flying at Green Flight Challenge!

e-Genius flying at NASA Green Flight Challenge. Image by Wernher Krutein / Photovault.com

We’re here at the NASA CAFE Green Flight Challenge on the third and final day of testing. The initial thirteen teams are down to four participants – three competitors and one demonstrator. Two all-electric planes are flying: e-Genius from Germany and Pipistrel Taurus G4 from Slovenia. An efficient piston plane, the PhoEnix from the Chech Republic, is the third competitor. And the first electric hybrid plane, Embry Riddle Aeronautical University’s EcoEagle, is flying as a demonstrator.

Pat Anderson of Embry Riddle Aeronautical University explains the workings of the EcoEagle to Erik Lindbergh and Jean Schulz at Charles M. Schulz Airport

Against the noise of the planes and jets taking off in the background, the silence of these planes is amazing. To emphasize the importance of this attribute of electric flight, on Saturday night LEAP will announce the winner of the first annual Lindbergh Prize for Quietest Aircraft at a celebration banquet hosted by CAFE Foundation. For more information about this prize, go to www.lindberghprize.org .

While the testing was not open to the public, there are plenty of media here to capture this history-making event, and we’ll post video to this website in the near future. On Saturday, there will be an all-day public open house here at Charles M. Shulz Sonoma County Airport. Be sure to come out and see these incredible planes, and the people who have designed, built and flown them.

On Sunday the planes will move to Moffett Field for Monday’s Google Green Flight Expo hosted by NASA Ames. The winner of the Green Flight Challenge will be announced at noon on Monday at NASA Ames. http://www.nasa.gov/centers/ames/events/2011/10_03_11-expo.html

~ by Yolanka

Pipistrel Taurus G4 landing at NASA Green Flight Challenge. Image by Wernher Krutein / Photovault.com

Save the Dates!

We’ve got two events coming up this fall, and we hope to see you there:

  • Join EADA to celebrate Green Flight!
  • We will hold the next EADA meeting in conjunction with ASTM’s F37 Committee meeting in Tampa November 2-3, 2011. Please let us know if you will be in attendance by emailing Yolanka@lindberghprize.org.

Please consider becoming a Founding Supporter of EADA today and help launch the electric flight industry!

~ by Yolanka