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from the worlds-first-commercial-electric-beaver dept.
The Guardian is reporting;
The world's first fully electric commercial aircraft has taken its inaugural test flight, taking off from the Canadian city of Vancouver and flying for 15 minutes.
"This proves that commercial aviation in all-electric form can work," said Roei Ganzarski, chief executive of Australian engineering firm magniX.
The company designed the plane's motor and worked in partnership with Harbour Air, which ferries half a million passengers a year between Vancouver, Whistler ski resort and nearby islands and coastal communities.
The recycled 62-year-old de Havilland Beaver seaplane is designed for short hops of 160 km or less, which represents the majority of Harbour Air flights. They're looking to save millions on costly maintenance and downtime. Harbour Air hopes to convert most of their airplanes after certification.
(Score: 2) by barbara hudson on Thursday December 12 2019, @07:36PM
This is Canada - not California. BC has tons of hydro power, so there's no need to make a one-to-one equivelace between electricity used and fossil fuels to generate that power.
Other dams fill most of the rest of the grid. That's why you have hydro towers strung all over the place. And why BC sells surplus power to the US. Same as Quebec.
People normally don't build urban metropolises in the isolated areas that dams tend to be located in.
Same as people don't have sprawling pig farms in the centre of major cities.
As more batteries need to be recycled, businesses will jump in to make money. One of the problems they're having now is that electric car batteries are lasting longer than projected, so they can't operate their facilities at peak efficiency. But that will come. Same as it did for companies that specialize in only rebuilding fork lift batteries, and companies that retread tires for heavy equipment.
Is an electric airplane that's juiced from hydro power greener than a diesel pickup truck? Looks like it.
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