TACOMA – Hydrogen Tanks in Composite Design

The development of a CFRP hydrogen tank for commercial aircraft is seen as a potential enabler of carbon-neutral flight. Cryogenic or liquid hydrogen (LH2) as a fuel, in combination with a turbine or fuel cell-powered engine, allows for superior storage efficiency to high-pressure alternatives, though only a weight-optimised storage solution can provide the necessary fuel quantities to realise wide-spread implementation in aviation.

The TACOMA project investigates the development, manufacturing verification, and testing of cryogenic hydrogen tanks in composite design for passenger aircraft, with a particular focus on the inner tank shells.

Carbon fibre reinforced plastics (CFRP) offer immense weight-saving potential compared to metal tanks, which is particularly important for aircraft with longer ranges. This advantage is usually tempered with higher manufacturing costs, though previous analyses have shown that both the structural weight and the manufacturing costs of a composite cryogenic hydrogen tank can be significantly lower compared to the metallic variant. The TACOMA consortium will therefore develop design methods for such a tank and implement and test the manufacturing technology.

The DLR Institute of Structures and Design is contributing its expertise in component design, particularly the development of manufacturing technologies and scaled demonstrators of thermoplastic composites. Significant preliminary work has already been carried out in terms of design, experimental material characterisation (in a cryogenic environment), coating concepts, and manufacturing processes, with the ultimate goal being test and verification of a tank structure under cryogenic conditions. To this end, the development and production of several thermoplastic CFRP tank cut-outs using automated fibre placement (AFP) with subsequent investigations and cryogenic tests are planned in the TACOMA project at the Institute of Structures and Design.