At the turn of the 20th century, the Wright Brothers made history by demonstrating that man could fly, not in a balloon, but in a plane. And they could control said plane, not just glide at the mercy of the winds.
Now, just one hundred and ten years later, another milestone of flight has been reached, when the Solar Impulse completed its around-the-world flight. And what makes this one special is that, unlike every other flight, this one consumed zero fossil fuels. Powered completely by solar energy, the plane wasn’t big or fast, but proved that you don’t need fossil fuels to fly a plane.
In the same week Solar Impulse proved the fundamental viability of emissions-free flight, the EPA determined that aviation contributes to greenhouse gas emissions, setting the stage for future regulations. This begins a long and arduous process for determining standards for airplane pollution.
Deniers, of course, are downplaying the importance of the Solar Impulse flight. Roy Spencer, for example, considers it a “Poster Child for the Impracticality of Solar Power” because the flight carried only the two pilots, and took over 16 months to complete (though 10 of those months were spent in Hawaii making repairs…)
But this is incredibly shortsighted thinking. Just a few years ago, it was considered physically impossible for solar power to take flight at all, due to the diffuse nature of the sun’s energy and the weight of batteries needed to store it. So this is an important debunking of a once-unchallenged assumption that flight needs fuel.
And when the Wright Brothers first flew in Kitty Hawk, just like the Solar Impulse, they carried no passengers. If there’s one thing that humanity has proven time and again, it’s our ability to innovate, improve and advance technology to make the impossible commonplace.
So while it is certainly true that the Solar Impulse isn’t poised to upend the airline industry any time soon, it proves that when it comes to clean energy’s potential, not even the sky’s the limit.
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