Vertical Aerospace “Selects Universal Fast-Charging Standard” to Accelerate eVTOL Deployment

UK-based Ver­ti­cal Aero­space, a devel­op­er of eVTOL air­craft, announced this week it has select­ed the Com­bined Charg­ing Stan­dard (CCS) for its VX4, join­ing BETA Tech­nolo­gies and Archer Avi­a­tion, reports a press release.

The release states, “This announce­ment marks an impor­tant step towards a glob­al, indus­try-wide charg­ing infra­struc­ture, ensur­ing easy inte­gra­tion for OEMs, oper­a­tors and infra­struc­ture providers, while reduc­ing costs and accel­er­at­ing the adop­tion of elec­tric avi­a­tion.”

It con­tin­ues, “The CCS fast-charg­ing stan­dard allows Vertical’s VX4 air­craft to achieve fast turn­around times, includ­ing rapid bat­tery charg­ing and con­di­tion­ing for shut­tle oper­a­tions. Vertical’s adop­tion of CCS will enable the com­pa­ny imme­di­ate inter­op­er­abil­i­ty with all CCS charg­ers of this stan­dard, includ­ing BETA’s grow­ing net­work.”

The announce­ment aligns with the Gen­er­al Avi­a­tion Man­u­fac­tur­ers Asso­ci­a­tion (GAMA) call for stan­dard­ised charg­ing sys­tems, essen­tial for scal­ing and com­mer­cial­is­ing elec­tric avi­a­tion, as out­lined in its paper, Inter­op­er­abil­i­ty of Elec­tric Charg­ing Infra­struc­ture.

Stu­art Simp­son, CEO of Ver­ti­cal Aero­space, com­ment­ed, “With cer­ti­fi­ca­tion efforts cov­er­ing five avi­a­tion author­i­ties and cus­tomers across four con­ti­nents, Ver­ti­cal, togeth­er with BETA and Archer choos­ing this stan­dard, means the indus­try has decid­ed.” 

He con­tin­ued, “Stan­dar­d­is­ing charg­ing infra­struc­ture is a cru­cial step in mak­ing elec­tric avi­a­tion com­mer­cial­ly viable. By adopt­ing the CCS, we’re ensur­ing that the VX4 can inte­grate seam­less­ly into a shared charg­ing net­work, which is great news for our cus­tomers and rein­forces our com­mit­ment to deliv­er­ing a scal­able eVTOL ecosys­tem.” 

David Dun­ning

David Dun­ning, Direc­tor of Glob­al Inno­va­tion & Pol­i­cy, Gen­er­al Avi­a­tion Man­u­fac­tur­ers Asso­ci­a­tion (GAMA), added, “A uni­fied charg­ing stan­dard is impor­tant as it assists in reduc­ing costs, stream­lin­ing oper­a­tions and accel­er­at­ing adop­tion of elec­tric air­craft, which ben­e­fits man­u­fac­tur­ers, oper­a­tors, infra­struc­ture oper­a­tors and pas­sen­gers alike.”

For more infor­ma­tion

https://vertical-aerospace.com/

(Top image: Ver­ti­cal Aero­space VX4 Air­craft in Flight)

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