Electric eye in the sky plan to check on water

A SOUTH African company is planning to develop the first electric unmanned aircraft built on the continent – and all for a good cause.

The UA Alpha is being developed by flyH2 and was exhibited at the Science Forum South Africa, held in Pretoria on Tuesday and yesterday.

One of the aircraft’s developers, Onno Huyser, said they wanted UA Alpha to be used for environmental research.

“We are a water-scarce country. We are losing about the amount of the Vaal Dam every year from people building dams where they are not supposed to, from illegal excavation and pollution.

“We have all these issues around water, and people are losing livelihoods. We are dealing with 80 percent of South Africans who are dependent on running water for agriculture, for their livelihoods, and drinking or washing.”

He said the use of the air- craft would be an easy way to monitor the environment.

“We reckon that by using this aircraft we can much more cheaply fly to those areas and map and monitor the state of the water, vegetation and land degradation.

“We want to do this in partnership with business, civil society, municipalities and national government. It is a national priority,” Huyser said.

The UA Alpha, which is currently a prototype, is run by hydrogen fuel cells.

Another developer, Mark van Wyk, said: “The hydrogen gets converted through fuel cells to energy, and the exhaust is water, so it’s 100 percent green, sustainable and renewable.”

Van Wyk said the aircraft can fly between nine and 22 hours before refuelling, depending on how much compressed hydrogen it has.

The pair are currently looking for R5 million funding to build the aircraft. The work will take about two years, and they are already taking preorders.