Will one of the benefits be absence of copious amounts of highly inflammable liquid on it in the event of crashes?
Won't batteries be a problem now?
Probably even worse, as fuel can be dumped.
Electric aircraft set to take flight by 2026 under new agreements
31–40 of 223 posts
Re: Electric aircraft set to take flight by 2026 under new agreements
#32Will one of the benefits be absence of copious amounts of highly inflammable liquid on it in the event of crashes?
No, lithium batteries are explosive. If anything, the fire hazard is probably worse.
https://www.popsci.com/story/technology/electric-vehicle-bat...
Re: Electric aircraft set to take flight by 2026 under new agreements
#33Note that they have agreed to buy them "conditionally… once the aircraft meet United's safety, business and operating requirements." The 2026 number in the title is probably without meaning. Nobody's meeting those requirements just yet.
Re: Electric aircraft set to take flight by 2026 under new agreements
#34Interesting that the routes they name are 119 and 78 miles. Kinda surprised Americans have flights so short. But then again the aircraft might beat CAFE for a vehicle with a single driver in it, plus aircraft usually carry a load of cargo too, as the passengers pay for the plane to go somewhere and the cargo is the profit. Wonder how much cargo this elegy plane can carry. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fuel_economy_in…
[Good] Rail travel in the United States is practically nonexistent and people are in a hurry.
Hopefully low-speed maglev becomes a thing
Re: Electric aircraft set to take flight by 2026 under new agreements
#35Will one of the benefits be absence of copious amounts of highly inflammable liquid on it in the event of crashes?
No, lithium batteries are explosive. If anything, the fire hazard is probably worse. https://www.popsci.com/story/technology/electric-vehicle-bat...
Yea, they can drop fuel if they know there will be a problem.
Re: Electric aircraft set to take flight by 2026 under new agreements
#36Earlier quoted context omitted.
It's all connecting to bigger flights. Plus 78-119 miles means either paying a lot of money for a cab, paying gas & parking fees for the duration of your trip at the bigger airport, or asking a friend/family member very nicely to take that trip to drop you off/pick you up. The smaller cities in question for these routes aren't going to have any sort of usable bus service for making a flight on time. To answer your ca…
> Plus 78-119 miles means either paying a lot of money for a cab, paying gas & parking fees for the duration of your trip at the bigger airport, or asking a friend/family member very nicely to take that trip to drop you off/pick you up. How about trains for those distances?
No, this is America.
Re: Electric aircraft set to take flight by 2026 under new agreements
#37Earlier quoted context omitted.
We already have trains, you know.
Trains are great in many cases, but there’s some limit to tunnels and bridges: you can go from Stockholm to Berlin directly, but Stockholm to Helsinki is harder (that’s actually the destination that the plane is likely to cover); Manchester to Amsterdam is feasible by train in theory, but given the constraints around London and the Channel Tunnel, unlikely to loose its flight connection. Same for Aberdeen to Oslo. Ma…
Helsinki - Stockholm has too many travellers for a 19-seater. :)
Planes like this will most likely be used for routes from very small local airports to larger regional ones. I'd guess it's more likely to cover things like Rønne - Copenhagen, or Mariehamn - Helsinki.
Re: Electric aircraft set to take flight by 2026 under new agreements
#38Re: Electric aircraft set to take flight by 2026 under new agreements
#39Wendover Productions (who else?!) recently released a video[1] on the future of electric planes. Quite a lot of information in there! [1]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aH4b3sAs-l8
LNA, an aviation industry newsletter, recently came to a very different conclusion [1]. The biggest difference to Wendover Productions's numbers is a hugely higher estimate in the cost of replacing the battery every 5-10 years due to battery degradation.
[1] https://leehamnews.com/2021/07/01/the-true-cost-of-electric-...
Re: Electric aircraft set to take flight by 2026 under new agreements
#40Note that they have agreed to buy them "conditionally… once the aircraft meet United's safety, business and operating requirements." The 2026 number in the title is probably without meaning. Nobody's meeting those requirements just yet.
>>Nobody's meeting those requirements just yet.
Someone is. What is very interesting about Harbour Air's approach is that they are not creating new aircraft but rather retrofitting electric propulsion onto their existing fleet. This is not an electric engine filling a niche application. Rather, this is electric replacing combustion engines on very longstanding commercial routes.
https://www.harbourair.com/harbour-air-magnix-and-h55-partne...
"After the successful first flight of the Harbour Air eBeaver powered by magniX in December 2019 and the ongoing flight tests since then, the companies have teamed up with H55 to bring their shared vision of clean, efficient and quiet commercial aviation to life by 2022. H55 will provide its proven modular battery technology to expand the eBeaver’s balance to weight ratio and endurance. The company’s battery modules have one of the highest energy densities on the market and will provide the entire energy storage system and redundant battery monitoring at the cell level for the eBeaver. "