Gallium-Based Heating Strips Reduce Aircraft CO2 Emissions
When road traffic grinds to a halt and the rail network is on strike at the same time, getting from A to B can quickly become difficult. Fortunately, there are also airplanes—especially when they can fly in winter instead of sitting snowed in on the taxiway. To speed up de-icing and reduce delays, a US startup developed a heating-strip system with special gallium-containing semiconductors at the end of last year.
Chemical De-Icing Often Cannot Prevent Delays and Flight Cancellations
The onset of winter is an event for which airports in all cities prepare thoroughly. Teams stand ready to de-ice aircraft during snowfall and sub-zero temperatures—using large quantities of chemicals and considerable effort. Nevertheless, delays and flight cancellations occur repeatedly. Even passengers on flights where “everything runs smoothly” must anticipate flight delays of 30 to 45 minutes. The longer-running engines also generate significant CO2 emissions.
Ice-Free and Ready for Takeoff Immediately After Boarding
The American startup “De-Ice” has the solution: a heating strip system that interacts with the aircraft’s electronics and allows it to thaw much faster than any chemical method. The technology has proven itself in numerous tests—snow and ice melt during the boarding process, so that the aircraft is completely ice-free as soon as it rolls out of the gate.
Air Canada Plans to Equip Entire Fleet to Protect the Climate
The company has already found a potential customer for its technology: Air Canada has tested the heating strips on an Airbus 320 and may equip its entire fleet with them. Murray Strom, Vice President of Flight Operations and Maintenance, sees advantages in the technology not only through reduced delays for passengers, but also as a contribution to climate protection. By reducing CO2 emissions through chemical-free de-icing, Air Canada can contribute to achieving global zero-emission targets by 2050 with this technology.
Gallium Nitride More Efficient Than Silicon
The heating strips are attached to the exterior of the aircraft. They then interact with technical components inside the aircraft and generate high-frequency current that melts the ice. The developers chose the semiconductor material gallium nitride because it has higher efficiency than silicon. Murray Strom describes the technology as the first real improvement in de-icing in several decades.
Gallium Is Part of Important Industrial Materials
Gallium already attracted attention last year. Contributing to this were the Chinese export controls that have been in effect since August 2023. Since this commodity is important for our industry, it even made it onto the program Galileo (as we reported). Here you can see not only that the metal is also part of other industrial materials such as gallium arsenide, but that it can also be used to break open aluminum bicycle locks.