• 26 Aug 2024 11:37 AM
• 0

Unither Bioelectronics and Robinson Helicopter Partner on Hydrogen

By Kenneth I. Swartz
Vertiflite September/October 2024

For the first time, a major aircraft manufacturer has partnered with a customer to develop a hydrogen-electric version of one of its models.

Dr. Martine Rothblatt, founder and CEO of United Therapeutics (UT), has been one of the visionary drivers of the electric vertical takeoff and landing (eVTOL) aircraft revolution since conceiving of a zero-emissions aerial transplant organ delivery system almost a decade ago.

The founder of Sirius Satellite Radio (now SiriusXM), Rothblatt went on to create United Therapeutics in 1996 to develop novel, life-extending technologies for patients in the areas of lung disease and organ manufacturing (see “Martine Rothblatt: Serial Entrepreneur,” Vertiflite, July/Aug 2022).

Rothblatt recognized that UT’s efforts to extend the viability of human organs for transplant — as well as xenotransplantation, which uses the hearts and kidneys of genetically modified pigs in human transplantation and regenerative medicine — would significantly increase the supply of organs available for transplant over the next decade or two. And that this would require a dedicated organ delivery system that was larger than that in place today.

In 2015, UT supported the development of a battery-electric retrofit of the popular Robinson R44 with Tier 1 Engineering of Santa Ana, California. The company also became an earlystage investor in two pioneering eVTOL aircraft companies — EHang of China and Beta Technologies of Vermont — and began working with Zenith Altitude and Piasecki Aircraft (see “Electric VTOL for Organs on Demand,” Vertiflite, March/April 2019).

On Sept. 21, 2016, Ric Webb, CEO of Part 135-charter operator OC Helicopters, made history when he flew the first-generation e-R44 for five minutes on battery power alone at Los Alamitos Army Airfield (KSLI) in California.

This was a month before ride-sharing company Uber released its audacious, tech-savvy Elevate white paper, “Fast-Forwarding to a Future of On-Demand Urban Air Transportation,” which brought the concept of eVTOL aircraft to public consciousness (see www.vtol.org/uber).

On Oct. 29, 2022, Webb with Rothblatt as co-pilot flew the third-generation e-R44 on a record-setting cross-country flight from Jacqueline Cochran Airport (KTRM) to Palm Springs International Airport (KPSP) covering the 24-mile (39-km) route in a flight time of 20 minutes, with the battery cells at a 50% state of charge (SOC) on landing (see “Tier 1 Engineering’s Electric e-R44 Makes First Cross-Country Flight,” Vertiflite, Jan/Feb 2023).

“This was the first-ever electric-helicopter flight between two cities and between two airports,” said Rothblatt after landing in Palm Springs, adding that it demonstrated that “it is practical to deliver transplantable organs by electric helicopters from hospital to hospital.” But the flight also highlighted the range limitations of an e-R44 with an 800-lb (360-kg) pack of state-of-the-art batteries.

Proof of Concept Hydrogen e-R44
No updates came out on the e-R44 program over the next 18 months until the Vertical Flight Society’s 80th Annual Forum in Montréal on May 9, 2024. That’s when Mikaël Cardinal, the Vice President of Program Management and Organ Delivery Systems and Head of United Therapeutics Organ Delivery Systems (UTODS), revealed that his team had been working on the development of a hydrogen-fuel-cell-powered version of the e-R44 for a year and a half, and had acquired its own R44 II, registration C-FXUB, in May 2022.

Cardinal showed the VFS audience photos of the proof-of-concept e-R44 — with two low-temperature proton exchange membrane (PEM) fuel cell stacks, a booster battery pack and a vacuum-insulated liquid hydrogen composite tank mounted under the tailboom — on the ramp outside the Unither hangar at Bromont Airport, about an hour east of Montreal. Using off-the-shelf components, the aircraft was designed to inform Unither decisions regarding the technology required for a certifiable aircraft (see “Hydrogen Begins to Take Off,” Vertiflite, July/Aug 2024).

Founded in 2018, the company's Bioelectronics subsidiary has overseen the company’s investments in various eVTOL companies and undertaken flight test activities in Canada to support the development of UTODS.

In July 2020, the company received a Special Flight Operations Certificate from Transport Canada to flight test an EHang 216 in Québec.

In September 2021, in a proof-of-concept flight using a small multicopter drone, Unither Bioelectronics transferred donor lungs for transplant between two hospitals, demonstrating the feasibility of delivering organs with zero carbon footprint aircraft.

Robinson Partnership
On Aug. 14, Robinson Helicopter Company (RHC) announced it had signed a collaborative agreement with Unither Bioelectronics to help accelerate the development and certification of hydrogen-powered versions of the popular R44 and R66 helicopter models.

United Therapeutics had been working with Robinson R44 helicopters for several years through Tier 1 Engineering's pioneering efforts on electrifying the the four-seat helicopter (see "Tier 1 Engineering Pioneers Electric e-R44,” Vertiflite, July/Aug 2022). Robinson's then-VP of Engineering, Pete Reidl, was very responsive in answering questions related to the design and operation of the R44. “Robinson has been extremely helpful and a participant in the program,” said Rothblatt in a mid-August interview with Vertiflite.

“We believe the time is now right for RHC to offer our resources and experience to drive the certification and production of the first generation of zero emission certified rotorcraft,” Robinson President and CEO David Smith posted on LinkedIn. “This is also a fantastic project with an incredibly inspiring mission. We are proud to team with UT on this lifesaving and historic effort.”

“This collaboration combines Robinson’s expertise in helicopter design to certify aircraft with Unither’s hydrogen-electric vertical lift technology,” the company posted on social media. “Together, we’re working to make rapid, zero-emission organ transport a reality, advancing the role of vertical lift technology in medicine and ultimately saving more lives.”

Rothblatt sees the R66, with a maximum takeoff weight of 2,700 lb (1,225 kg), as an ideal candidate for hydrogen-electric power, but most of the company’s research work in electric propulsion has, to date, utilized a 2,500-lb (1,135-kg) R44 Raven II.

Recent developments also mean that Transport Canada will be taking the certification lead on two of the most advanced electric motor retrofit programs — the Unither R44/R66 and the Harbour Air DHC-2 eBeaver program — by way of supplemental type certificates (STCs).

Organ Delivery System
“I could not be more pleased with how things have transpired since 2015,” said Rothblatt.

On the biomedical front, UT “is on the cusp” of delivering to a hospital its 500th donated lungs refurbished through ex vivo lung perfusion (EVLP) — an innovative therapy applied to donor lungs outside of the body — for transplant, said Rothblatt, adding that over the past few years there have been multiple xeno-kidney and xeno-heart transplants. The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) recently approved a clinical trial of a Unither bioengineered-organ for the first time, notably an investigational-stage external liver assist product (ELAP) that is designed to provide liver support in critical care settings.

UT recently “completed manufacture of the first clinical xenotransplantation production facility in Christiansburg, Virginia, which will be able to produce 200 transplantable kidneys and a hundred transplantable hearts year after year, once there’s FDA approval,” Rothblatt added.

“All of these pieces that we were planning in 2015 are actually falling right into place, right on schedule,” she said. “Not to mention the fact that it’s been extremely gratifying to see the entire eVTOL industry grow from essentially nothing to a high state of maturation with literally billions of dollars of capital invested in it.”

Hydrogen Pivot
Rothblatt said that Unither’s pivot to hydrogen fuel cell development was already mapped out on the day the e-R44 made its cross-country flight to Palm Springs, adding that “when you’re doing technology development, it’s very wise to have multiple shots on goal, because it’s very hard to predict the exact course of any given technology’s development, because it depends on so many other streams of technology pouring in, not to mention regulatory factors as well.”

One of the mission requirements for an aircraft employed by the United Therapeutics Organ Delivery System is enough range to fly between organ manufacturing facilities and transplant hospitals, and Unither didn’t see battery chemistry evolving fast enough for an electric helicopter. However, “we realized that… all of the work that we’ve been doing on motor development… can be pushed to much greater ranges… if we shifted from batteries to hydrogen fuel cells.”

Rothblatt recalled that in early meetings with Cardinal more than eight years ago, they recognized that “Canada, and especially Québec, is a perfect nursery… for an electric aviation program because it has an overlap of the two key ecosystems that you need for electric aviation.” The first ecosystem was aviation. Québec is a world center of excellence and home for major aircraft original equipment manufacturers (OEMs), such as Bell and Bombardier Aerospace, which were supported by “great regulatory expertise.”

The second ecosystem was associated with Hydro-Québec, the third largest hydropower producer in the world, “which has been a green electric power producer from the very beginning.” Rothblatt believes that Hydro-Québec’s exclusive reliance on hydroelectric power generation also positions the utility to be “the greatest source of green hydrogen… in the Americas.”

Rothblatt believes there are parallel marketplaces for battery-electric aircraft, such as the Beta Alia, and hydrogen-powered aircraft within its planned organ delivery system.

“There are only a hundred hospitals in the country that have the wherewithal to transplant hearts, lungs, kidneys and livers. And those are our customers,” she said. As of August 2024, UT has announced plans to establish organ manufacturing facilities in Christiansburg, Virginia; Manchester, New Hampshire; and Stewartville, Minnesota. “So, it is not difficult for us to store hydrogen at essentially a hundred locations. And that’s a very different scenario to a package delivery operation [with] thousands of touch points throughout the country [that require] either refueling or recharging.”

Rothblatt envisions that during the startup phase, the company will employ something like a half-dozen green hydrogen delivery trucks coming from Québec to the US to refill the tanks that Unither’s hydrogen-electric rotorcraft will use to refuel. 

Next Steps
Cardinal says that Unither’s focus this year is about consolidating the change product rule analysis that will drive the STC effort with Robinson.

“When you’re trying to do some changes to an already-type-certified vehicle, the data set and the expertise brought in by the OEM will be tremendously helpful in terms of accelerating the actual certification roadmap [and] the timelines related to that. I believe that this is a very smart way to address the challenges of flying with an electric propulsion system, given that the airframe that we’re using has been in service for so many years and more than 13,000 [Robinson] helicopters are out there,” said Cardinal.

Rothblatt expects that Unither will start delivering manufactured organs by electric VTOL aircraft “before the end of the decade” and that will become “the predominant form of organ delivery in the next decade. It’s just been a dream scenario, really.”