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Electric Aviation is already better than you think - Volts with David Roberts (www.volts.wtf)

submitted 4 months ago by Dippy@beehaw.org to c/technology@beehaw.org

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Electric vehicles that can take off and land vertically, but then fly like a plane, are already being sold and used by hospitals and shipping companies. These vehicles have 5 batteries that give it a range of over 350 miles using current battery technology, though the batteries are intended to be swapped over the life of the aircraft, much like the engine of a traditional aircraft, however, future batteries could feature improvements, meaning the vehicle gets better over time. The redundancy that Electric motors allow more easily than mechanical motors means this aircraft is far safer than anything else in the air.

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[–] megopie@beehaw.org 13 points 4 months ago (3 children)

I see a lot of potential for electric aircraft for short haul flights between regional airports, or for distribution of cargo between hubs, but not in any sort of dispersed capacity. Hub to warehouse cargo? Sure! Delivery to doorsteps or air taxi? hell no.

Anything that isn’t flying along a designate air route between already establish large volume facilities is just fundamentally impractical due to the safety issues with aircraft. No amount of new tech will solve how fundamentally dangerous a 4 ton hunk of metal going at 160MPH going anywhere but a designated route away from populated areas is.

[–] flora_explora@beehaw.org 4 points 4 months ago

Yeah, especially since even self-driving cars prove to be a much bigger headache to accomplish than anticipated. If we cannot even figure those out in so many years, it will take even longer to add a whole other dimension to all the variability.

[–] lemming934@lemmy.sdf.org 3 points 4 months ago

Short haul flights should probably be high speed train rides anyway

[–] Dippy@beehaw.org 1 points 4 months ago

Oh yeah no. This guy has no dreams that don't comply with the current FAA rules