With the advent of electric airplanes, a group of engineers and designers took a radically different path than the “fast, heavy” trend that prevailed in the 20th century.
Using light materials and an exaggeratedly large wingspan they managed to put enough solar panels on the wings to never need to land, especially when high above the clouds. In a plane, altitude is energy storage so through a mix of slow descent and just the right amount of batteries, the cruise goes through each night peacefully.
Travel is a different experience than transport and living a few weeks over the clouds is actually a very nice break from the bleak city life.
aviationeast@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
Sounds like a boat cruise with less space. Why not just use a helium blimp instead?
keepthepace@slrpnk.net 2 weeks ago
Oh this is just the dining Cupola, you should see the greenhouse and the swimming pool if you think it is cramped up!
Why use non-renewable helium when you can just use more elegant, more renewable, more steerable solar power?
(In all seriousness, I am trying to give an idea of a high-tech sustainable future that’s not just “small scale farming with solar panels”)
Dasus@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
Basically you’re making a plane so huge that the batteries you need will weigh a fuckton, increasing weight and need for power even more.
What’s the wing setup for such an incredible massive plane, and what kind of battery / solar do you expect to be available?
I’d like to remind you that the larger the objects volume, the smaller the surface area in relation. Like a mouse has vastly more surface compared to it’s size than an elephant or a blue whale does.
What I mean by this is that the larger you make the plane, the less surface area you’ll have for solar. Unless you add more materials and make it even larger.
I would like to see a thing such as you describe, but it doesn’t sound too plausible.
Blimps don’t need to use helium, btw. Technically you could have an empty blimp. (void is lighter than air, duh) It’d just be quite the engineering challenge to have it not implode at the sizes required.
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