Future Transportation Systems - Decreasing Fuel Consumption and Exhaust Gas Emissions in Transportation - page 279

propeller

H reservoir
2

fuel cell

Fig. 17.11 Fuel cell powered experimental airplane

17.2.2.8 Development of Airports

All forecasts assume growth in air traffic. Particularly, the leading airports will
have to cope with more air traffic in a few years. For solving the task, several ways
are imaginable to increase airport capacity [ 44 ].
The first way is intensive international cooperation which will be generally
necessary to solve the problems. In this process, airfreight may be shifted from
civilian airports to former military airports. Parallel to it, smaller secondary air-
ports could be strengthened more for intercontinental aviation with modern nav-
igation and communication equipment.
The demand for very short distance air travel could decrease in the future
depending on fuel prices, infrastructure, and economy. This problem should be
solved by development of special low cost airplanes with open, contra rotating
turbofan engines with high efficiency.

17.3 Future Trends in Ship Technology

Shipping will be presumably developed with the highest speed in transportation.
However, development could be decelerated by intensively increasing fuel costs.
In the future, ships will profitably use wind and sun energy. Theoretically, natural
energy has an unlimited energy-saving potential on the open sea. Nevertheless, this
attractive potential has not been used recently, because no existing photovoltaic,
thermal, or solar power systems can fulfill all of the power requirements of a ship.