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<ul class="summary-list"><li>The eight winning designs for Hamburg Aviation's 14th <keyword id="11105671" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="60" keywordseo="crystal-cabin">Crystal Cabin</keyword> Award contest was announced.</li><li>Of these eight designs, four included new concepts for <keyword id="6420597" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="60" keywordseo="Airplane">airplane</keyword> cabins and seating.</li><li>These are the creative cabin designs, from coworking spaces to seats that can turn into gaming lounges.</li></ul>The process of air <keyword id="6354692" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="100" keywordseo="Travel">travel</keyword> has evolved greatly throughout COVID-19, and some organizations have taken this evolution one step further by creating renderings of completely redesigned airplane cabins for an international contest.Before the COVID-19 pandemic first began, these organizations - which include the likes of <keyword id="6356166" type="ORGANIZATION" weightage="60" keywordseo="airbus">Airbus</keyword>, the <keyword id="192745" type="ORGANIZATION" weightage="60" keywordseo="University-of-Cincinnati">University of Cincinnati</keyword>, and <keyword id="412278" type="PERSON" weightage="60" keywordseo="Safran">Safran</keyword> - submitted their "flying in the future" concepts to Hamburg Aviation's 14th Crystal Cabin Award contest. Many of the <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/airplane-cabin-interior-designs-show-future-of-air-travel-2020-1">designs that came out of these submissions look nothing like any cabin</a> that currently exists and include touches like in-flight spas and capsule hotel-like sleeping spaces.<a href="https://www.crystal-cabin-award.com/cca-news-realeases/article/award-winning-8-ideas-for-flying-in-the-future.html">On March 30</a>, Crystal Cabin announced the eight winners of its latest contest, which "make it clear that the aviation industry is not standing still despite the current crisis," it wrote in a<a href="https://www.crystal-cabin-award.com/cca-news-realeases/article/award-winning-8-ideas-for-flying-in-the-future.html"> press release</a>. Of these eight designs, four were of airplane cabins or economy seat concepts, while the rest included new ideas for trolleys, in-flight Bluetooth entertainment, and more.These are the four winning cabin redesigns from the contest, which range from a "coffee house" look to private seats that can turn into gaming lounges. They're not coming to aircraft any time soon, but they're a hint at potential avenues the air travel experience might go down in the future.<h2>1. Airbus' flexible configurations</h2><div type="image" title="Airbus_Airspace Cabin Vision 2030" height="1249" width="2500" msid="82087561" hostid="261"></div>Airbus' Airspace Cabin Vision 2030 went home with the "Visionary Concepts" award for its lounge-like "flexible" seating that can turn a guest's space on the plane into a gaming lounge or a family hangout spot. The individual seats also provide some more privacy and options for customization as each seat can have its own "ambiance" setting.The full Airspace Cabin Vision 2030 concept also includes an in-plane bar, sleeping bunks, and a gym, because who wouldn't want to workout while a few thousand feet in the air?<h2>2. <keyword id="5906185" type="ORGANIZATION" weightage="60" keywordseo="eviation-aircraft">Eviation Aircraft</keyword>'s "fishbone" style</h2><div type="image" title="Eviation_Almadesign_Alice" height="1249" width="2500" msid="82087564" hostid="261"></div>If you prefer the window seat, you might like this next design. Eviation Aircraft's Alice, an electric commuter jet, won the "Cabin Concepts" trophy for its "fishbone" style seating arrangement.The electric jet can carry nine people a little over 620 miles. With this concept seating arrangement, each passenger will get a view of the skies out the window.Read more: <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/venture-capital-vcs-electric-aviation-startups-2020-11">Meet the 8 electric aviation startups poised to blow past the jet age and modernize air travel and logistics, according to industry experts</a><h2>3. University of Cincinnati's "coffee house cabin"</h2><div type="image" title="University of Cincinnati_Coffee House" height="1665" width="2220" msid="82087566" hostid="261"></div>If you're on a deadline crunch, enjoy open-concept offices, or just want to feel productive on a flight, why not consider a coworking cabin space. The University of Cincinnati's "coffee house cabin" took home the "University" award for its integration of a work table in the middle of the plane. The concept is more than just a few chairs around a workspace. The table also comes with screens that can pop up, creating a physical separation for passengers sitting across from each other. And when the aircraft is taking off or landing, the chairs can turn to face the front of the plane, while the sides of the table can fold downwards.In theory, the prices for these seats would be more expensive than basic economy, but more affordable than first class.<h2>4. Safran Seats' upgraded economy seats</h2><div type="image" title="Safran Seats_Modulair S" height="1249" width="2500" msid="82087570" hostid="261"></div>If you're stuck in economy and craving more comfortable seats, Safran may have a solution. Safran's Modulair S concept took home the "Passenger Comfort Hardware" category award for its integration of neck rests, multi-level tables, and a designated space that can be used to prop up tablets.

4 award-winning airplane cabin designs show that the future of flying could look like coffee shops or gaming lounges

<ul class="summary-list"><li>Air travel makes up 2.5% of global carbon dioxide emissions, and that number is growing, far <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2019/09/19/climate/air-travel-emissions.html#:~:text=Over%20all%2C%20air%20travel%20accounts,passenger%20cars%20or%20power%20plants">outpacing predictions</a>.</li><li>Israeli company <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/electric-plane-by-eviation-plans-challenges-2018-4">Eviation</a> might have a path to sustainable travel with its all-electric passenger <keyword id="6356222" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="60" keywordseo="plane">plane</keyword>, <a href="https://www.eviation.co/alice/">Alice</a>. </li><li><keyword id="256217" type="PERSON" weightage="60" keywordseo="Alice">Alice</keyword> can fly up to 650 miles emissions-free and is set to replace large jet <keyword id="6367788" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="60" keywordseo="planes">planes</keyword> on regional routes.</li><li>Thanks to its lithium-ion battery, Alice is practically silent in the air and is expected to bring 40 to 80 percent cheaper airplane tickets.</li></ul>Following is a transcript of the <keyword id="21654" type="COMPANY" weightage="60" keywordseo="video">video</keyword>.Narrator: This is the world's first full-sized, all-electric passenger plane. Her name is Alice. Now, she isn't the first attempt at an electric passenger plane. Previous attempts looked like this, a glider or an old seaplane retrofitted with an electric engine. But Alice is different.Omer Bar-Yohay: The <keyword id="10228961" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="60" keywordseo="eviation">Eviation</keyword> Alice is a nine-passenger, two-crew, all-electric commuter <keyword id="6385716" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="60" keywordseo="aircraft">aircraft</keyword>. This aircraft is built from the ground up to be electric. It's not a conversion of anything.Narrator: Israeli aeronautics company Eviation started work on Alice back in 2015 and debuted the plane in June 2019. Its goal? To find a sustainable way to move people regionally. Air travel is one of the fastest-growing contributors to climate change. And even mid-pandemic, when travel has dipped, the airline industry's carbon footprint is still outpacing predictions. Regional travel is a big component of that footprint. In 2017, half of the 4 billion air tickets sold were for regional flights. Even though these were short distances, the aircraft used were huge jet planes built to cross oceans.Bar-Yohay: That's an insanity because we're using the wrong tools for the job.Narrator: Alice might be a solution for these popular commuter routes. Think New York City to DC or even up the West Coast between San Jose and San Diego. The plane is built to fly up to 650 miles on just one charge of its lithium-ion battery, the distance from London to Prague. And it's designed to carry passengers at cruising speeds of about 276 miles per hour. Now, that's about half as fast as jet-fueled planes, so a one-hour-10-minute flight from New York City to DC would be about two and a half hours on Alice, but Alice could do that journey emissions-free. It seems ideal, but engineers faced a few challenges while building Alice.Bar-Yohay: It has a huge battery. We have roughly 3.6 metric tons of battery, over 8,000 pounds.Narrator: In electric cars, a battery's weight isn't as much of an issue, because cars stay on the ground. But in a plane, trying to get in the air with a heavy battery becomes a challenge. The bigger the battery, the more power for the plane, but a bigger battery also means more weight to lift, so more power is needed to get it in the air. In normal airplanes, an estimated 30% of the plane's maximum takeoff weight is jet fuel. And that weight lessens over time, as jet fuel is burned while in the air. But for Alice...Bar-Yohay: We're roughly at 60% of maximum takeoff weight, meaning 60% of the plane when it takes off is battery. It's the same when it lands; we don't lose anything.Narrator: So Eviation had two solutions for a heavy battery. Engineers distributed the battery throughout the plane.Bar-Yohay: That battery's literally all over the place. It's under the floor, it's in the wings, in the fuselage in different locations.Narrator: Then they balanced out the battery's sheer weight.Bar-Yohay: The way to do it is just to build everything else very light.Narrator: Alice has a lightweight airframe, slim wings, and wing-tip propellers.Bar-Yohay: It has a lifting body, which means it looks like a, for lack of a better description, an upside-down boat. All of those features were built to create a more efficient airframe at cruise.Narrator: Another key feature that sets Alice apart is its lift-to-drag ratio, or how much lift the wing generates compared to how much drag it creates moving through the air. A regular plane has a lift-to-drag ratio of 17:1. For Alice, that rate is 25:1, meaning it's more aerodynamically efficient and uses less energy getting into the air. For future passengers, all this environmentally conscious innovation means a lot less traveler's guilt.Bar-Yohay: I think it's important that the industry looks at its responsibilities to the planet and makes itself more sustainable in terms of emissions, but it needs to work economically.Narrator: Some players in the industry say electric planes could mean 40% to 80% lower airfares. That's because it doesn't cost as much to operate an electric plane. Eviation's Alice costs about $200 per flight hour to operate. A similarly performing turboprop would cost between $1,200 and $2,000 per flight hour. But in order to be truly sustainable, Omer says people have to actually want to fly electric.Bar-Yohay: This needs to feel like a plane you want to use daily.Narrator: So, how does Alice do that? Designers wanted the windows to be big enough to increase visibility, and they added stability technology to help with turbulence. Plus, Alice's electric engine is practically silent.Bar-Yohay: This plane is dramatically less noisy, about two orders of magnitude less noisy than an equivalently sized aircraft. I think it could change the way we treat airports.Narrator: Despite testing hiccups in early January, Omer estimates the plane will be certified by 2022. US-based airline Cape Air has already decided to buy the aircraft at $4 million per plane. The airline plans to introduce Alice into its fleet, serving regional routes from Boston to Nantucket, Martha's Vineyard, and up into New Hampshire and New York.Bar-Yohay: In the very beginning, it was extremely difficult to convince partners, clients, anybody, investors that we're not delusional. Today it feels like everybody's on board and this is where the industry should go. The industry is beginning to notice that there is really a tectonic shift here.

Inside a $4 million electric plane, the first full-size, all-electric passenger aircraft in the world

<div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image on-image">EviationEviation started building the Alice Commuter electric aircraft in 2017.</div></div></div><ul><li>Israeli startup Eviation plans to bring an electric aircraft, the Alice Commuter, to market in 2021.</li><li>The Alice will hold up to nine passengers, fly up to 650 miles between charges, and reach a cruising speed of 276.19 mph.</li><li>It will also have autonomous capabilities, which the company plans to use to move the aircraft without people and transport goods.</li></ul> "Building something this size and at this level of complexity as a startup is insane."Eviation CEO Omer Bar-Yohay is talking about the Alice Commuter, an electric aircraft the Israeli startup - which was founded in 2015 - plans to bring to market in 2021. The Alice will hold up to nine passengers, fly up to 650 miles between charges, and reach a cruising speed of 276.19 mph. While Bar-Yohay didn't disclose the company's clients, he said he expected to sell "a few dozen" aircraft between 2021 and 2022.But first, Eviation has to build them, a process the company began in 2017, and one that brings challenges at each step."It's extremely difficult, extremely costly, and the level of talent that you need to compete for, the level of supply chain agreements you need with the big players is very, very significant," Bar-Yohay said in an interview with Business Insider.<h2>Batteries are one of the biggest remaining hurdles to electric flight</h2>Look to the auto industry, and you'll find plenty of ambitious startups with flashy concepts that never reach the market. According to Bar-Yohay, Eviation won't meet a similar fate."We do intend to build the aircraft, which is a big statement," he said.The reward for doing so at a sustainable cost could be an impact on regional aviation that echoes how <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/category/uber">Uber</a> and <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/category/lyft">Lyft</a> have reshaped the ride-hailing industry. Bar-Yohay said the Alice will have lower operating and maintenance costs than traditional aircraft, which could make some short-haul routes that are only available to those with private jets affordable for a wider range of customers.In addition to long-term cost advantages, electric aircraft will be quieter than those powered by jet fuel and able to maintain stability in difficult weather conditions. But there's one problem that needs to be solved before they can make commercial flights: batteries. Much of the technology the Alice needs to operate has been worked out, but there's no universal standard in the aviation industry for batteries that can power electric engines. Bar-Yohay thinks that standard will arrive by the end of the year."Without a clear path to certification, everybody's bleeding money," he said. "No one really knows what's going to work and what's going to be accessible to the regulators, which really makes for uncertainty in terms of the time to market."While motors, high-power electronics, and a lot of other solutions are already set in stone in terms of the way forward, the batteries are still a bit vague."<h2>Electrification will pave the way for autonomy</h2>As in the auto industry, electrification is expected to pave the way for autonomy. Bar-Yohay said fully-autonomous flight will become available in the next 15 years, but before that can happen, aviation companies need to master the necessary technology and convince both regulators and the public that it's safe. According to Bar-Yohay, it's easier to build autonomous planes than cars, since planes don't have to deal with pedestrians and unexpected objects suddenly blocking their path. And much of the technology necessary for pilot-less flight is already available."It really is easier, technology-wise, to build an autonomous aircraft, and a lot of the technological components are already there," he said.The Alice will have autonomous capabilities when it begins service, and Eviation plans to use them to move the aircraft without passengers and transport goods, in the hope that demonstrating reliable, autonomous flight will build trust with lawmakers and potential passengers.Eviation and its competitors will also use what Bar-Yohay called "extreme pilot augmentation," which will resemble the semi-autonomous driver assistance systems car companies like Tesla, General Motors, and Volkswagen have introduced in their vehicles.<h2>Eviation wants to match Tesla's success, not its manufacturing strategy</h2>Any startup developing electric <keyword id="34991" type="ORGANIZATION" weightage="60" keywordseo="transportation">transportation</keyword> designed for consumers lives in the shadow of Tesla, which, under the guidance of CEO <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/category/elon-musk">Elon Musk</a>, has achieved a market capitalization that rivals General Motors and <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/category/ford">Ford</a>'s just fifteen years after its founding. While Bar-Yohay hopes Eviation will replicate Tesla's success, he noted a significant difference between their strategies. Tesla has defied auto industry conventions by controlling much of the manufacturing process for its vehicles, but Eviation is not attempting that level of independence for financial and regulatory reasons."We do not intend to go it alone the way Tesla did, because we don't see the kind of financial resources that they had in the very beginning," Bar-Yohay said. "In aviation, there is a lot more to respect in legacy, because you need those certified facilities and you need the brand name in front of the regulator."Eviation may not reshape the airplane manufacturing process in the way Tesla has attempted to (<a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/elon-musk-says-model-3-production-using-to-many-robots-2018-4">with great difficulty</a>) for cars, but according to Bar-Yohay, being able to work with big names like Siemens and Honeywell suggests Eviation is onto something. "If they want to play with us, we're doing something right," he said. <div class="margin-top"> <h3>NOW WATCH: <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/shift-from-growth-to-value-could-signal-the-end-of-the-bull-cycle-2018-4">There's a major shift occurring that could signal the end of the historic bull market</a></h3> <div> </div> </div>

This startup has big plans to become the Tesla of electric planes

<ul class="summary-list"><li>Since <keyword id="99719" type="PERSON" weightage="60" keywordseo="Joe-Biden">Joe Biden</keyword> took office, there have no reports of US drone strikes or civilian casualties.</li><li>This comes after Trump carried out more strikes in Somalia and Yemen than all other presidents combined.</li><li>"If there is a pause in <keyword id="597031" type="PERSON" weightage="60" keywordseo="airstrikes">airstrikes</keyword> overall, we hope it's due to a reassessment of the United States' strategy," said <keyword id="104489" type="ORGANIZATION" weightage="60" keywordseo="Amnesty-International">Amnesty International</keyword>'s Daphne Eviator.</li></ul>It's a dark rite of passage for new, post-9/11 US presidents: Usually, within the first weekend, the fresh commander-in-chief, having inherited a global war on terror, orders the military or an intelligence agency to end someone's life with an airstrike. To adversaries, it demonstrates resolve; to allies as well as critics, it demonstrates that there will be continuity, no matter which party controls the White House.President Joe Biden, it appears, has been different. Under his watch, there has been just one declared US airstrike: a February 9 attack in Iraq that, <a href="https://twitter.com/OIRSpox/status/1359785919667195904">the military claims</a>, "resulted in the deaths of two Daesh terrorists."And in stark contrast to his immediate predecessors, there have been no immediate reports of civilian casualties - this, following months of escalated US attacks, from Central Asia to Africa, during his predecessor's last couple months in office.Clandestine operations, by their nature, cannot be ruled out. What we know for sure, though, is that "there have been zero local or official reports of US drone or other strikes in Somalia, Libya, Yemen, or Pakistan so far under Biden," Chris Woods, director of the monitoring group <a href="https://airwars.org/">Airwars.org</a>, told Insider.Biden's forerunners, Republican and Democrat alike, both carried out US military operations that were both well-publicized and fraught, the demonstration of American power resulting in the death of innocents.Former President <keyword id="15962" type="PERSON" weightage="60" keywordseo="Barack-Obama">Barack Obama</keyword> ordered his first drone strike <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/jan/23/drone-strike-victim-barack-obama">within 72 hours</a> of taking office; that attack, aimed at the Taliban and carried out by the CIA, missed its mark, killing three Pakistani civilians and gravely wounding a child. The tactic would come to <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/obama-says-couldnt-look-soft-terrorism-as-a-liberal-president-2020-11">define Obama's legacy</a>, boots on the ground replaced by unmanned aerial vehicles, American lives protected at a cost borne by others.Former President <keyword id="6354484" type="PERSON" weightage="60" keywordseo="Donald-Trump">Donald Trump</keyword> oversaw his first drone strike on January 20, 2017, the day he was inaugurated. A spree of attacks took place in Yemen, culminating a week later in a botched raid that <a href="https://archive.attn.com/stories/14648/spicer-comments-united-states-lead-raid-killed-eight-year-old">killed an 8-year-old girl</a> and other civilians. Over the next four years, Trump would go on to bomb the country more often <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/trump-have-bombed-yemen-more-than-bush-and-obama-combined-2020-10">than any of his predecessors combined</a> - not counting ramped up US support, <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/biden-is-ending-us-support-for-offensive-operations-in-yemen-2021-2">just rescinded</a>, for the Saudi-led war against the nation's Houthi militants.Biden is no peacenik. In the US Senate, he backed the 2003 invasion of Iraq. And there is no reason to believe a lull amid a pandemic and other domestic crises will evolve into a policy of unilateral disarmament.Nicholas Grossman, a professor of international relations at the University of Illinois and author of a <a href="https://experts.illinois.edu/en/publications/drones-and-terrorism-asymmetric-warfare-and-the-threat-to-global-">book on drone warfare</a>, wonders if the apparent pause in most US military operations is the aftermath of his predecessor's outgoing escalations."Under Trump, the US ramped up drone strikes in Somalia, though that escalation was already happening in Obama's final year," Grossman told Insider. According to data from the New America Foundation, a think tank in Washington, there were 43 airstrikes in Somalia targeting the extremist group al-Shabaab, during Obama's two terms in his office, including 16 in his last year. During Trump's single four-year term, where a focus on rhetoric led many <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/trumps-waging-a-phony-war-against-the-military-industrial-complex-2020-9">falsely to label him a principled isolationist</a>, there were 208 such airstrikes, including 14 in his final six months.There have been previous gaps in US strikes, Grossman noted; a lot or a little can happen in three weeks. It's also possible, he said, that this is something more: "the Biden administration is pausing while reviewing the strategy." Relatedly, "it's possible the US military and intelligence agencies launched a few strikes at the end of Trump's term in anticipation of that pause."Alternatively, "it's also possible that those January strikes did real damage to al-Shabaab as intended, and for that reason there either isn't a need or a good opportunity at the moment," Grossman said.Critics of the US-led war on terror hope the apparent moratorium signals something greater."If there is a pause in airstrikes overall, we hope it's due to a reassessment of the United States' strategy," Daphne Eviatar, director of the Security With Human Rights program at Amnesty International, told Insider, "and a recognition that past strikes have not succeeded in ending attacks by armed groups, but have instead killed and injured thousands of civilians."Have a news tip? Email this reporter: <a href="mailto:cdavis@insider.com">cdavis@insider.com</a>

There have been zero reported US drone strikes since Joe Biden took office

<ul class="summary-list"><li>Air <keyword id="6354692" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="60" keywordseo="Travel">travel</keyword> is not good for the <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/airlines-scramble-to-overcome-polluter-stigma-as-flight-shame-movement-grows-2019-6">environment</a>.</li><li>Business Insider spoke with four aerospace firms betting on electric <keyword id="6367788" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="60" keywordseo="planes">planes</keyword> as a solution.</li><li>They all have their own version of electric <keyword id="6385716" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="60" keywordseo="aircraft">aircraft</keyword>, from <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/first-commercial-electric-plane-completes-test-flight-video-2019-12">retrofitted</a> combustion planes to a new <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/eviation-targets-commuters-with-electric-plane-alice-2019-6">electric plane</a> built from scratch.</li><li>But battery technology and lengthy regulatory hurdles are keeping these planes grounded. </li><li>If they can get these aircraft airborne, they could mean a future of air travel that's quieter, cheaper, and better for our planet.</li><li><a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/?hprecirc-bullet">Visit Business Insider's homepage for more stories</a>.</li></ul>Following is a transcript of the <keyword id="21654" type="COMPANY" weightage="60" keywordseo="video">video</keyword>. Narrator: What could a future with electric planes look like? $25 tickets, quieter airports, or even shorter runways. Companies have been betting on battery-powered planes for this cleaner future. But even though electric planes have been around since the 1970s, they haven't really taken off. So, what's keeping them grounded? In the late 1800s, two French army officers experimented with electricity to propel an airship, but they ran into problems when the battery just couldn't hold enough energy. This would become a recurring problem for the next 100 years. When nickel-cadmium batteries were invented, the first flight with an electric motor took off, but it only lasted less than 15 minutes. Then, in the 1980s, lithium-ion batteries were invented. They could store more power than ever before, leading to planes like the Solar Impulse 2. Starting in 2015, the solar-powered aircraft spent 16 months flying around the world, except it flew at an average speed of 28 to 34 mph. Solar Impulse 2 is part of a movement in recent years to develop alternative energies, especially when people and governments started realizing just how bad flying was for the environment. The aviation industry emitted about 1 billion tons CO2 in 2019. That's about 2.5% of global emissions. That might not sound like a lot, but it's almost as much as the entire continent of South America emits in a year. Kevin Noertker: We need to make changes to the industry, and electrification is one of the big trends which will hopefully reduce that burden. Narrator: Electric planes have been on people's mind for a while, but two big problems are keeping electric grounded. First, the technology's not quite ready. When you're trying to get an electric plane off the ground, you want a battery that packs a lot of punch in a little package, but... Carolina Anderson: Batteries are not as efficient as gas, and they're probably not gonna be for a while. Narrator: A battery's efficiency, or ability to hold power, is measured in specific energy. Right now, even the best batteries have a specific energy of only 250 watt-hours per kilogram, but we have to get closer to 800 to really start flying, and that is still nothing compared to jet fuel's specific energy, which is nearly 12,000 watt-hours per kilogram. Think about it like those computers from the '80s. They were huge, but way less powerful than the sleek ones we have today. Right now, batteries are like those '80s computers. They're not as powerful as they need to be, and they're not just big, they're also heavy. So if you want to add more power to a plane, you need to get a bigger battery, and to get that plane airborne despite the weight, you'll need even bigger battery that's more powerful, but that means more weight. And then you'll need an even bigger battery to offset that weight. Oh, you get the point. But even if engineers design a plane around the shortfalls in battery tech, they have to take on the industry's second hurdle, certification. In the US, that means getting permission from the Federal Aviation Administration to test and fly an electric plane. Companies have to prove every inch of their aircraft is safe, passing a series of tests, one of which is to make sure the battery cells won't catch fire. Roei Ganzarski: If something goes wrong, you can't stop. You can't pull to the side of the road. There's only one place for that <keyword id="6420597" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="60" keywordseo="Airplane">airplane</keyword> to go. And so the regulatory stringency is much higher, the requirements for reliability, redundancy, and safety are much higher for a good reason. You have no alternate. Narrator: The FAA amended its rules in 2016 to allow electric propulsion systems in <keyword id="6569650" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="60" keywordseo="airplanes">airplanes</keyword> built for up to 19 passengers. The real problem, though, is that certification, even with these amendments, takes years, so companies have gotten creative. They've started to retrofit old planes to get certified quicker. Ganzarski: You're taking out the entire old, gas-guzzling, emission-creating engine and its fuel system, and replacing that space and weight with an electric propulsion system. Narrator: Retrofitting has happened in phases. The first phase was from Slovenian company Pipistrel. It created the world's first all-electric two-seater plane back in 2007 by putting an electric engine in a glider. Tine Tomažič: Gliders are safe to fly by definition, even without a functioning engine, so we were able to experiment without putting anybody at risk or do harm to anyone. Narrator: Today, those planes are used for pilot training. The second phase: a hybrid. Los Angeles company Ampaire replaced one of the two engines in a 1973 Cessna with an electric one. Ampaire hopes to get its new plane, the Electric Eel, certified for commercial flights by 2021. And, finally, over in Vancouver, electric-motor manufacturer MagniX and Vancouver-based airline Harbour Air flew a retrofitted 62-year-old plane. A 15-minute test flight in December 2019 made it the world's first all-electric commercial plane to fly. It proved that electric could actually take off. The two companies' goal is now to electrify the rest of Harbour Air's fleet of more than 40 seaplanes and have it certified by the end of 2021. So, retrofitting seems perfect. The problem, though, is that it limits you to what the plane structure is already built for, so if the original motor is, say, 1,000 pounds, and you remove it, then... Ganzarski: I only have 1,000 pounds to put back in, right? I can't make the total package heavier. Narrator: Electric motors are smaller and lighter than gas ones, but remember, those batteries are heavy. Ganzarski: So you lose range because batteries, for the same amount of power, are so much heavier than fuel. Narrator: So while Harbour Air and MagniX figured out the balance of weight in their plane, the range took a hit. Their electric plane can go over 100 miles, a little less than the distance from Seattle to Vancouver, but for electric planes to be successful long-term, they'll have to go farther. Israeli company Eviation might have a solution. Instead of retrofitting an old plane, its engineers built a plane from scratch. The nine-seater plane, Alice, was designed around the battery to reduce weight. Omer Bar-Yohay: That battery's literally all over the place. It's under the floor, it's in the wings, it's the fuselage in different locations. Narrator: Alice, in theory, could fly up to 650 miles, roughly a flight from Las Vegas to Denver, but because it was built from the ground up, getting her certified is taking longer. Bar-Yohay: We're very confident that we will be testing the plane in flight early 2020 and believe that from that point on the certification process will take about two years. Narrator: Each electric plane in development is different, but they all have one thing in common: they're going after flights under 500 miles. And while it may not seem like an impressive distance, these short-range electric planes could solve a major problem in travel. In 2018, a little less than half of all air tickets sold globally were for flights under 500 miles, but instead of using small, efficient planes designed for these shorter routes, we often use expensive airliners built to fly thousands of miles. These planes are most efficient if they're able to cruise for a long period of time, but on a flight that's 50 minutes, these planes go up, and they come right back down. Currently, a 109-mile flight from Los Angeles to San Diego emits about 110 pounds of CO2. Bar-Yohay: For a technical-savvy person, that's an insanity, because we're using the wrong tools for the job. Narrator: In the last four decades, flying regional with commercial jets got so expensive for airlines in the US, Europe, and Australia that they began stopping service to regional airports. Today, of the 20,000 FAA-approved runways in the US, only 2.5% are currently active. The regional airports left are running at a loss or even going bankrupt, but electric planes could be a fix, and there's already an infrastructure for them. Omer says 11,000 of those 20,000 US runways could support an electric plane, which is a lot cheaper to operate. Alice could save about $800 per flight hour compared to a normal turboprop plane. Noertker: It's a tenfold increase in the number of potential destinations, all the while not having the significant burdens on the communities of noise and pollution. Narrator: As for the distant future, electric aviation could come in all kinds of forms. Uber is already working on an electrical vertical takeoff and landing vehicle, or eVTOL, that could pick you up right at your house and fly you to an airport. Even big players like Airbus, Boeing, and Rolls-Royce are betting on this future. Tomažič: We set out on a journey that's akin to crawling, walking, running, leaping. We're now in the phase of walking. The running part will be the bigger electric airplanes flying longer distances, and the big leaps, coming in a decade or so, will be the eVTOL segment, which is vertical takeoff and landing electric-powered machines that effectively take off and land where we want them, bringing the airports to people. Narrator: Everyone we talked to said that's still about 15 years off, and now that an electric plane has actually proven successful, those in the industry are hopeful that investment into battery development will start rolling in. Because to break out of that infinite power and weight loop we were talking about, we're gonna need more efficient batteries for electric planes to really take off. Bar-Yohay: The question is, when does it make economic sense and who has the many billions it will take to bring a product like this to market in 15 years' time? So, is it the future? Absolutely. Read the original article on <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/electric-planes-future-of-aviation-problems-regulations-2020-3">Business Insider</a>

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