Electric vehicles are becoming pretty commonplace, so much so that you probably hardly pay attention when a Tesla or other electric vehicle pulls up next to you at a stoplight anymore. Now imagine the same thing, but with the airplane next to yours, at your local airport.
Flying on an electric-powered airplane is getting pretty close to reality. In fact, at the recently concluded Paris Air Show, a US airline actually placed the very first order for electric powered planes. It's a commuter airline, named Cape Air, which provides short haul flights, principally in Boston and St. Louis, but out of the Caribbean and Billings, Montana.
The electric-powered plane is called Alice. It comes not from Boeing or Airbus, the world's two big commercial airplane manufacturers. Instead, it will be produced by an Israeli startup called Eviation.
Eviation is another classic case of innovation coming from outside an industry. The company was founded by Aviv Tzidon, a serial entrepreneur who has founded more than ten companies, three of which have been listed on NASDAQ and another on the Frankfurt Stock Exchange. He's a named inventor on some 15 patents. The co-founder, Omer Bar-Yohay, is a physicist with expertise in propulsion systems.
The company has also developed a drone called the Orca. It can cruise at about 150 knots and has a range of 500 miles. It is three meters in length with a wingspan of 4.5 meters.
Don't plan on reserving a seat on an upcoming Alice flight for a while. The new plane is only at the test flight stage now, but it's expected to receive commercial certification in 2021. Eviation expects to deliver the first Alice planes in 2022.
In contrast to a Boeing 777 or Airbus 380, boarding Alice should be very easy. It will only seat 9 passengers and have room for two pilots. While it will be small, each plane is expected to have a range of up to 650 miles, and Alice will cruise at 300 miles per hour. According to Eviation, Alice could go to an altitude of 30,000 feet, but it will fly at a typical altitude of only 10,000 feet, in contrast to the typical 30,000 to 40,000 foot cruise altitude of a Boeing 737 or other large commercial aircraft.
Alice will have three propellers. It will probably look a bit strange, as each wing tip will have one propeller, and the third propeller will extend out the rear of the plane. The rear propeller will provide the main propulsion. The wingtip propellers will help to reduce drag, as well as provide redundancy and additional propulsion according to the company.
Powering each plane will be a 900 kW lithium ion battery. The prototype battery will be approximately nine times the size of Tesla's largest current battery. Alice's battery will come from a South Korea battery manufacturer called Kokam.
In comparison to a Boeing 737, Alice is pretty small. The 737 is nearly 4 times as long as Alice, and its wingspan is slightly less than 3 times that of Alice. The truly big difference between the two planes is the maximum take off weight. A Boeing 737 could have as many as 177 passengers, plus a crew of about 6, and have a total weight of about 175,000 lbs. In contrast, Alice will have a maximum take off weight less than one tenth that of the 737.
Fortunately, Alice's price tag will be commensurately lower. Where a typical 737 costs about 100 million US dollars, Alice will cost about 4 million.
Cape Air presently operates about 90 Cessna 402's, an aircraft of similar size and capacity to Alice, but which is a pretty old plane, the last having been built in the mid-1980's. Cape Air also operates several Britten-Norman Islanders, a British aircraft that has been in production for some forty years, but is reportedly still in production. The Cessna's and Britten-Norman Islanders, however, cost Cape Air a fraction of the reported $ 4 million price tag of the Eviation's Alice. The obvious question to ask is, will the lower maintenance costs, as well as elimination of fuel, make up for the higher capital outlay?
Each Alice will, by virtue of being an electric aircraft, be much simpler to maintain for Cape Air, just as the expected maintenance cost on a Tesla should be much lower than on a conventional automobile. This should be especially true since the newest of Cape Air's Cessna 402's is at least 30+ years old. Britten-Norman Islanders are still in production, so presumably they are much newer than the Cessna's.
Of course, Cape Air will no longer have to purchase fuel. The airline should be able to save at least $ 900/day on fuel for each, assuming each plane operates 10 hours/day and fuel costs $ 2.50/gallon. That works out to about $ 300,000 in fuel savings per year. While that's a substantial savings on fuel, it probably won't be enough to justify the $ 4 million price tag on the plane. Chances are, it will take 12 to 15 years of fuel savings to cover the capital cost differential. Very few, if any, commercial enterprises can justify that length of payback period.
Cape Air has other fuel-related costs. For example, the airline has to pay the cost of fuel trucks, as well as the personnel to do the fueling. Those savings will add up, but the payback will still likely be substantial.
To make the Alice a commercial success, it will take other savings. The likely place to look is maintenance. Most likely, each new Alice will have a substantially lower maintenance cost than planes in the current Cape Air fleet, especially those 30+ year old Cessna's. The cost of keeping 35+ year old planes running smoothly is substantial.
The ability of the Alice to be a commercial success will depend upon more than the technical merits.
The company may have some other ideas for the Alice besides shuttling passengers to and from places such as Logan Airport in Boston. Chances are, Cape Air will only be flying passengers between the hours of 6 am and 10 pm. Likely no passenger wants to be flying between 10 pm and 6 am, but maybe those planes could be used for cargo. How about doing some sub-contract work for Amazon or UPS, especially if the plane could operate as a pilotless drone? Sure, a lot of passengers won't be comfortable getting on a plane that doesn't have a living, breathing pilot at the controls, but the package you need the Postal Service to deliver probably isn't quite so particular. So Alice might have a "dual personality": passenger ferry by day and package drone by night. The economics might get a lot more attractive.
While Alice will likely be the first electric commercial aircraft, other planes are under development. Rolls Royce, the British carmaker and jet engine company, is working on its own electric aircraft. The company hopes to set a speed record when it takes its maiden flight the next few years. According to company reports, the Rolls Royce craft will feature three high-power density electric motors capable of generating more than 500 horsepower.
Will the Alice, or even the Rolls Royce system, become commercially viable? At this point, it's too early to tell. However, even if neither becomes successful, electric powered commercial aircraft should become viable in the next few years. Getting electric powered planes will not only reduce operating costs, they should have a very positive impact upon the environment, too. There's increasing concern about greenhouse gas emissions from aircraft. This will be a small but important first step.
