Quantum computing's role in facilitating carbon emission reductions within the aviation sector?
In a bid to pioneer sustainable aerospace for a safer and more united world, Airbus is exploring the potential of quantum computing to optimize aircraft design and boost airline operations.
Optimizing Aircraft Operations and Logistics
Airbus, in collaboration with BMW Group and quantum companies like Quantinuum and Q-Ctrl, is using hybrid quantum-classical workflows and quantum optimization algorithms to improve supply-chain logistics, route scheduling, and operational efficiencies within manufacturing and mobility networks. These efforts address complex, constrained optimization problems at scale, which classical computing struggles to solve efficiently.
Fuel Cell Simulations for Hydrogen Propulsion
Airbus is leveraging quantum computing to accurately simulate electrochemical processes fundamental to hydrogen fuel cells, which power the ZEROe hydrogen aircraft demonstrator. This simulation capability can accelerate development of fuel cell propulsion systems that generate zero CO₂ emissions when powered by renewable energy, aiding Airbus’s goal for market-ready hydrogen-powered commercial aircraft by 2035.
Computational Fluid Dynamics and Material Simulation
While direct CFD application examples for Airbus were not explicitly cited, quantum computing’s ability to simulate materials and chemistry at quantum scales—key to advancing aerodynamic materials and systems—is a known target area. DARPA’s HARQ initiative highlights that heterogeneous quantum computing architectures can enhance scalability for materials and chemistry simulations, which would benefit aerospace research including CFD.
Advancing Hybrid Quantum-Classical Workflows
Airbus integrates quantum computing into its existing industrial workflows to solve real-world problems on today’s and near-future quantum machines, showing practical quantum advantage potentials for aerospace engineering and operational challenges.
Efficient Cargo Loading with Quantum Computing
Half of global airfreight travels onboard passenger flights, and efficient cargo loading is a significant challenge due to limited space and the need for precise weight distribution. Quantum computing can leverage the 'knapsack problem' to calculate an optimum solution for loading packages into cargo containers and the containers into the hold, addressing this challenge effectively.
Quantum Computing's Role in Sustainable Aviation
The speed and accuracy of calculations are crucial for trajectory optimization, and quantum algorithms could help optimize an aircraft's trajectory in real time, taking air traffic restrictions and weather patterns into account. Quantum's appeal lies in its ability to overcome computational bottlenecks, and it is expected to play a key role in sectors such as secure communications, banking, aerospace, and more.
In 2022, Airbus performed a use case demonstrator using IonQ's quantum computer for efficient cargo loading, demonstrating the practical application of quantum computing in aviation.
The Quantum Mobility Quest
The Quantum Mobility Quest is a joint initiative launched by Airbus and the BMW Group in 2023, aiming to accelerate and mature quantum solutions for the industry's most complex challenges. It is part of a broader European effort, as Airbus is a member of EQUALITY, a consortium dedicated to developing quantum algorithms to solve paradigmatic industry problems, including those in aerospace.
Together, these efforts demonstrate quantum computing's transformative promise to optimize aircraft operations logistics, enable detailed fuel cell electrochemical modeling, and enhance material and fluid dynamic simulations critical for next-generation aircraft design and sustainability goals.
[1] Airbus (2023). Quantum Computing for Aerospace: The Airbus-BMW Group Quantum Mobility Quest
[2] Airbus (2023). Airbus and BMW Group launch the Quantum Mobility Quest to accelerate quantum solutions
[3] DARPA (2021). Heterogeneous Quantum Architectures for Large-Scale Applications
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