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Navy Spends $33 Million For Hybrid of the High Sea

Posted by samzenpus on from the batteries-not-included dept.

coondoggie writes "Some might call it an enormous floating Prius, but others will call it a step in the right direction: A new hybrid electric engine for US Navy ships that promises to save up to 12,000 barrels of oil a year per ship. The folks who brought you the Predator unmanned flying aircraft, General Atomics, this week got $32.7 million to develop a proof-of-concept Hybrid Electric Drive (HED) system for a full-scale demonstration on board the Navy's DDG 51 Class destroyers. DDG 51 destroyers are powered by General Electric gas turbines capable of moving the ships along at over 30 knots or about 35 mph. The General Atomics system would meld into this system and let the ship use electric power for slow-speed maneuvers. The engines would provide more power as the ship needed to go faster."

6 of 210 comments (clear)

  1. What would happen... by lxs · · Score: 4, Interesting

    If 30 tons of Lithium batteries burst open on the high seas? After,say, a torpedo strike?

    I bet it would be spectacular.

  2. Submarines by Skraut · · Score: 4, Interesting

    I would have thought that the Navy would have led hybrid engine research with everything that was done in WWI and WWII for submarines. Essentially those were hybrid engines, with the diesel's powering the boat on the surface and recharging the batteries, and then using the batteries when the ship was submerged.

    That has all been supplanted by nuclear submarines, but you have to wonder where battery technology would be today if the Navy had kept using that system.

    --
    Introducing Microsoft Vacuum 1.0 The first Microsoft product that doesn't suck.
  3. Only? by whisper_jeff · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Only $33 million? For a military contract? Really? Not to be a smartass, but that seems insanely cheap for what they're asking for.

  4. Re:Nice thing. by INT_QRK · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Electric drive for low speed is not such a bad thing, especially when conducting passive sonar search. It would make them kind of stealthy, from an acoustic point of view. Antisubmarine Warfare is, after all, an important mission area for Destroyers.

  5. Re:So that's where our tax dollars go. by tcopeland · · Score: 3, Interesting

    > Also oil costs dont factor into the
    > cost of physically refueling the ship.

    Well said. That includes the time it takes to complete the evolution. Especially underway it's a major pain; running those hoses over and keeping station is no joke. If you could cut the number of UNREPs in half you'd be saving resources all over.

    --
    The Army reading list
  6. technical and fiunancial details. by auric_dude · · Score: 3, Interesting
    The general view of DDG-51s of this project

    http://www.informationdissemination.net/2009/07/good-reason-for-flight-iii-burkes.html and the reasons for this work.

    A defence Industry view

    http://www.defenseindustrydaily.com/327M-to-General-Atomics-for-DDG-51-Propulsion-System-Prototype-05598/#more-5598

    A general Atomics view

    http://www.ga.com/news.php?read=1&id=262