NWT/NUNAVUT
For many, the term airship is associated with Goodyear tires and the Hindenberg disaster, but the oft-mocked mode of transportation could make a comeback as the solution to infrastructure woes in Canada's North.

University of Manitoba professor and president of Bouyant Aircraft Systems International Barry Prentice, stands beside an airship prototype his team has been conducting experiments on in Winnipeg. - photo courtesy of Barry Prentice

First used over 100 years ago, the mechanics of the airship have not changed much. A power-driven vehicle kept buoyant using helium or hydrogen gas, the airship has the ability to move through the air using its own power and carry large loads exceeding 100 tonnes over a significant distance. Used primarily during the First World War, airships quickly lost favour following the invention of jet engine aircraft and a number of high profile accidents including the Hindenburg explosion of 1937.

Now, eighty years later, the technology is being revisited as pressure mounts to extract mineral resources with less funding. Because they require very little in terms of landing accommodation and use minimal energy, the airship is being lauded as an alternative form of transportation to remote regions.

More than just mining

Prentice says many of the issues plaguing the North stem from poor transportation and as winter roads continue to degenerate and shifting permafrost damages existing infrastructure, these will only be exacerbated. He said airships would negate the need for the construction and maintenance of pricey all-weather roads and provide access to mineral deposits which are currently inaccessible.

"When you look at the ice roads, we've already lost half the season we used to have," he said. "I can't see them being around in 10 to 15 years if this climate change continues and nobody seems to be getting prepared for it."

He said poor health and poverty can also be traced back to transportation issues in the North and airships could lower food costs.

"Politicians will spend a billion dollars on education in the North, but that's not going to help anybody in terms of their housing or cost of food," he said. "It's pretty hard to digest mathematics when your stomach is rumbling."

Cost of purchasing and operating an airship is up to three times less than traditional air craft with a maximum load capacity of 250 tonnes surpassing that of a 747 jet, travel speeds of 145 kilometres per hour and zero carbon emissions.

Bureaucratic barriers

However, Prentice says current legislation - or lack of - is impeding the initiative's progress, adding his staff were required to obtain hot air balloon licences to fly the ships, despite a jarring dissimilarity between the two vehicles.

"A hot air balloon has no engines, it just go where the wind takes you with a big burner and propane," he explained. "An airship has no burner or propane, it has engines and . a whole landing procedure - in a hot air balloon, every landing is a crash landing."

An age-old ban on hydrogen use in airships is also stalling the technology, along with global depletion of helium says Prentice. Without one or the other, it's unlikely to move forward.

"We have this prohibition on hydrogen, based on a decision 93 years ago in a foreign country . we picked that up and put it in our regulations in Canada without any thought or testing," he said. "We could develop an industry based on helium but . it's a dead end. There was supposedly 100 years of helium left in the world and that's great by what do we do in year 101?"

Transport Canada spokesperson Natasha Gauthier told News/North in an e-mail regulation of airships falls under the general framework for all aircraft in Canada. She said the federal government is monitoring the industry's evolution as global companies begin to patent the technology.

"Airships are viewed as providing unique capabilities in the transport of heavy and oversized payloads, particularly in remote areas lacking the infrastructure to support road, rail and other air services," she said.

Department of Transportation spokesperson Nick Hurst said the GWNT is following the technology's development but has not taken any cohesive action to get ships into the territory.

"We're staying abreast with it as we stay abreast with all technologies," he said. "It gets brought up now and then and if it starts to look like a viable reality then like any technology we'll look into it and see if it works for us."

Prentice said commercial airships could potentially be in use within two to three years with government support and certification. Currently his team is testing the viability of different models in cold weather conditions and said the rigid aluminum shell Zeppelin model seems to be the best option. Nevertheless without government support, he is unsure when we might see the fabled blimps floating across the sky.

"The problem is you've never had a politician step to the mic and say, 'I like airships'," he said. "If you don't like the airship idea, what's your suggestion? If you don't have a suggestion then why aren't we trying this?"