The system
One power system. Delivered as a qualified aircraft capability.
Three elements are scoped together: what flies, what supports it on the ground, and the hydrogen source. Scope is set by the mission, not by a catalog.
Airborne
Qualified endurance system
- Fuel-cell module sized to the aircraft duty cycle
- Certified commercial hydrogen storage
- Hybrid battery for transient and contingency power
- H₂AS controller for power management and safety states
- Aircraft installation kit: mounts, ducting, exhaust, harness
Ground
Cylinder support package
- Certified prefilled cylinder exchange workflow
- Handling, restraint and storage equipment
- Digital cylinder tracking and service life records
- Refuel, leak-check and maintenance procedures
- Crew training and readiness documentation
Optional
Field hydrogen module
- Partner PEM electrolyzer
- Purification to fuel-cell grade
- Certified compression and filling
- Remote monitoring of the generation chain
- Deployed only where delivery logistics fail
Architecture
We select the best module for the aircraft, not the reverse.
Selection is supplier-agnostic and driven by mission data. Each element is chosen against a stated basis and a stated customer benefit.
| Element | Selection basis | Customer benefit |
|---|---|---|
| Fuel-cell module | Power density, thermal envelope, duty-cycle tolerance and qualification maturity | Continuous power sized to the mission without over-mass |
| Hydrogen storage | Certified commercial cylinders only; service life, inspection regime and logistics availability | No bespoke pressure-vessel program; installed aviation use still requires program-specific safety substantiation |
| Hybrid battery | Transient and peak support, contingency reserve, cycle life at mission temperature | Launch, climb and payload transients covered without oversizing the stack |
| H₂AS controller | Power management, hydrogen detection, emergency states and data logging | One endurance-system control and safety owner across the power system |
| Aircraft installation kit | Mass properties, CG limits, ventilation and exhaust routing, maintainability | Repeatable installation and configuration control across the fleet |
Preliminary. Element selection, sizing and mass properties are subject to customer-specific analysis against confirmed mission inputs.
Responsibility boundary
Explicit scope on both sides of the interface.
H₂AS owns
- Endurance power system architecture and its aircraft interface
- Hybrid power-management controls
- Thermal, ventilation and exhaust requirements and system-side design
- Hydrogen detection and emergency shutdown
- Qualification evidence and configuration control
- System acceptance and fleet readiness
Your team retains
- Aircraft performance requirements
- Payload and mission architecture
- Flight-control authority
- Airframe structural approval
- Final airworthiness decision
- Operational command and CONOPS
This split is the starting point, not a contract. The interface control document issued at Gate 2 supersedes it, and design authority on every line is confirmed with your chief engineer before hardware is committed.
Build vs buy
Why not develop hydrogen capability in-house?
Some programs should. The decision turns on whether hydrogen power is a capability you intend to own for a decade, or a subsystem you need qualified on an aircraft.
| Dimension | Build in-house | Buy the system |
|---|---|---|
| Time to first qualified flight | Hydrogen team hired, safety analysis started from zero, test rig built before any flight hours accrue | Gated program against an existing architecture and a reusable preliminary safety architecture |
| Qualification evidence | Your team authors hazard analysis, FMEA, environmental and flight evidence and defends it | Evidence package is a contract deliverable under configuration control |
| Specialist headcount | Fuel-cell, hydrogen safety, thermal and controls engineers retained permanently | Your engineers stay on airframe, payload and mission |
| Hydrogen logistics | Cylinder certification, handling, tracking and crew procedures developed in-house | Certified cylinder exchange workflow, tracking and training delivered with the system |
| Supply position | Direct dependence on individual module vendors, with ownership and supply terms negotiated per vendor | One US-owned accountable supplier holding the integration and the interfaces |
Preliminary. Comparison is qualitative and program-dependent; no schedule or cost outcome is implied or guaranteed.