Fuel cell manufacturer Intelligent Energy showcased its latest aerospace fuel cell hardware, developed under the UK’s £54 million H2GEAR research initiative, at the Farnborough International Airshow 2026.
Speaking beside the demonstrator unit, head of aerospace programmes Martin Goodwin detailed the system’s design architecture and performance milestones. The unit displayed at the event has demonstrated power outputs exceeding 150 kW during testing.
The assembly features a bottom section containing the main fuel cell stack and end plate, housed within a carbon-fibre enclosure engineered to minimize overall system mass. Above the stack, an upper module houses the high-voltage systems and primary electrical outputs.
The unit incorporates an integrated exhaust and water management circuit positioned at the front of the assembly. The subsystem extracts exhaust air, performs water separation, and recycles the recovered liquid by re-injecting it directly back into the stack to support internal thermal management and humidification cycles.
The H2GEAR programme, led by GKN Aerospace and supported by the Aerospace Technology Institute (ATI), focused on developing scalable hydrogen-electric propulsion architectures for future regional aircraft and urban air mobility platforms. The technical developments from the 150kW demonstrator unit serve as a foundational step for Intelligent Energy's commercial IE-FLIGHT series, including the £17 million ATI-backed HEIGHTS programme aiming to deliver a 300kW modular aviation fuel cell system.
