A pioneering flight around the world will use nothing but sunshine for fuel. In the dusty peach dawn of a desert day, the Solar Impulse 2 airplane took flight at 11:12 PM Eastern time on March 8 from Abu Dhabi on the first leg of a bid to fly around the world exclusively powered by electricity generated from sunlight.
The primary structural component is carbon-fiber sheets that weigh just 25 grams per square meter, or roughly three times lighter than a similar sized piece of paper. That carbon fiber is used sparingly in structural spots where forces push on the airplane. But the interior of the wings, the fuselage and other areas are empty to save even that tiny bit of weight, co-pilot Bertrand Piccard explained to Scientific American.
Atop those wings, as well as the body and even the tail of the plane, are 17,248 solar cells as thin as a human hair that generate electricity as the plane flies, some of which is stored in four lithium polymer batteries. Those batteries take over powering the plane’s four electric motors at night, which spin the two propellers under each wing. All told the plane weighs 2,300 kilograms and the four batteries are the heaviest passengers, weighing in at 633 kilograms. Making the plane required 12 years of calculations, computer simulations, building and testing, according to Piccard, and some $140 million.
Scientific American:
Solar Plane Takes Flight to Circle Globe in 180 Days [in Photos], David Biello
Site: Solar Impulse
You Tube: Solar Impulse Channel
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