United orders 100 electric planes

[begreen]

Interesting start to a regional commuter fleet.

United Airlines Is Buying 100 Zero-Emission Electric Planes From a Swedish Startup

The airliner is confident that Heart Aerospace can bring its 19-seat electric ES-19 aircraft to market by 2026.

robbreport.com

 

[stoveliker]

I still think that this is more of an investment to help the field, to also create goodwill, but not so likely to succeed.

The range barely covers ATL-TYS, and now they fly planes there that are deployable on multiple ranges. Having a plane that can go no farther than 250 miles greatly limits their flexibility (divert because of storms...?) in managing a fleet.

Good, but biokerosene is likely to be more realistic.

 

[begreen]

We'll see. You have to start somewhere. There are some distinct advantages with electric flight including less noise and lower vibration. In our area, there are several airports within the flight area. Seattle to - Bellingham, Vancouver, Spokane, Portland, Bend, Roseberg, Boise are all within easy range.

Press conference with Heart from Dec 2020:

 

[begreen]

More on the air-taxi front, this time in the US. Joby Aviation expects to be ferrying local passengers within 3 yrs. It has some serious heavyweights financing it and on its board. They are starting out with a small 5 passenger craft for local hops, but this one could be a disrupter if successful.

Joby Aviation | Joby

A Better Way to Move

www.jobyaviation.com

 

[peakbagger]

United also ordered a supersonic jetliner so they are covering their bets.

 

[DeadTreeBurner]

Interesting start to a regional commuter fleet.

United Airlines Is Buying 100 Zero-Emission Electric Planes From a Swedish Startup

The airliner is confident that Heart Aerospace can bring its 19-seat electric ES-19 aircraft to market by 2026.

robbreport.com

This is great! Except that they're really not zero emissions considering all the fossil fuel that will be burnt to mine the materials for batteries, not to mention environmental impact/pollution in those areas and pollution from batteries that have died and aren't being properly recycled. Waste batteries from EVs, and all of our other devices are becoming a serious problem. The reality is that "green" tech isn't as green as the politicians want us to believe. Oh, and United can hire Ibram X. Kendi, Robin DiAngelo and Nikole Hannah-Jones to teach them how to manipulate their ranks and score brownie points with the new Marxist crowd. It'll be great!

 

[stoveliker]

By equating energy budgets in production and life-time use with a political line of thought you've provided sufficient reasons to ignore that remark...

 

[clancey]

I am not ignoring it because I can see them doing this for smaller loads for delivery but not when the planes get 250 miles and carry 19 people...It's not ready for the masses as of yet..The electric cars in CA were burned up in the sun and not usable no more so they scrape them.. I guess they did not use a metal frame or something for their electric vehicles Then there is a discussion about Lithum in regard to the above statements and that would take a short book as well and I would surely be censored..Yea electric vehicles are nice but they need to get a whole lot more done before they are usable for us common people,,,I love their lawn mowers and smaller items that you can recharge but I just do not think they are ready for air travel at this time ---just most likely trying to chime in on the trillion dollar debts coming for our kids to pay off if it ever gets paid off and "Our country will be owned" if it isn't already...clancey

 

[stoveliker]

I do not know what ill-informed story that is about burning up cars in the sun, but I've seen many Chevy Volts and Nissan Leafs parked in the hot Tennessee summer at 100 F on asphalt in a windless valley that drove away day after day from my workplace.

 

[begreen]

FWIW, our Volt survived the 108º heat bomb without a hiccup as did all the others that I know of.

Note that the battery pack in the United planes will be modular and leased. An end of life a recycling plan will be in place. And also note they do not expect the planes to be certified until 2026.

 

[stoveliker]

Our Volt survived the 108º heat bomb without a hiccup.

Precisely. My (ice) car was often 145 F inside with the thermometer low in the car in the shade (below the parking break). Those Volts and Leafs were as hot.

 

[clancey]

Trying to get a picture of the buses that are melting in the sun...clancey

CA Agency May Scrap Electric Bus Fleet After Electric Buses Melt in California Sun, Catch Fire, Cost Too Much to Fix | The Gateway Pundit | by Cristina Laila

The electric bus idea is going down in flames – literally.

www.thegatewaypundit.com

 

[stoveliker]

Trying to get a picture of the buses that are melting in the sun...clancey

CA Agency May Scrap Electric Bus Fleet After Electric Buses Melt in California Sun, Catch Fire, Cost Too Much to Fix | The Gateway Pundit | by Cristina Laila

The electric bus idea is going down in flames – literally.

www.thegatewaypundit.com

So there is a bus that went bad. The tens of thousands of electric cars on the road are not. So no reason to stop the latter. Just a poor design of that bus company.

Same as the two batteries that started a fire in some (787?) Boeing plane. Did we stop all flying at that point? No, we fixed the problem.

Given that those Tesla's and Leafs are not melting or burning, we know how to do it. We know how to fix the problem.
No need to throw away the child with the bathwater....

 

[clancey]

Yea but we are talking about planes here and it makes a difference..Like I wrote I can see them transporting small weight items to different locations but they are certainly not ready for mass transportation in the skies..They could even figure out away to do these smaller planes by remote or something but certainly not passengers as of yet..clancey

 

[stoveliker]

Yea but we are talking about planes here and it makes a difference..Like I wrote I can see them transporting small weight items to different locations but they are certainly not ready for mass transportation in the skies..They could even figure out away to do these smaller planes by remote or something but certainly not passengers as of yet..clancey

But that has nothing to do with the argument you used to discredit the idea of electric planes: you pointed to a burning bus.

 

[clancey]

i could not remember if the article was for buses or planes but same difference only its up in the sky..Oh brother--Lordy not me., They are talking about 19 people and 250 miles --they need to improve on that to have mass transportation at the moment. Of course if you have hundreds of thousands of dollars you might be one of the 19 people at this time like the people who went to the edge of space..clancey

 

[stoveliker]

i could not remember if the article was for buses or planes but same difference only its up in the sky..Oh brother--Lordy not me., They are talking about 19 people and 250 miles --they need to improve on that to have mass transportation at the moment. Of course if you have hundreds of thousands of dollars you might be one of the 19 people at this time like the people who went to the edge of space..clancey

Sure they need to improve. But United is not in the business of selling $100,000 seats. They are geared to transport masses, and that is what they are aiming (hoping) for here. It won't be like those space enthusiast billionaires.

 

[bholler]

Yea but we are talking about planes here and it makes a difference..Like I wrote I can see them transporting small weight items to different locations but they are certainly not ready for mass transportation in the skies..They could even figure out away to do these smaller planes by remote or something but certainly not passengers as of yet..clancey

Yes you are right we aren't there yet. But if we keep working on it we will be and we can then be the leaders in the industry. No innovations aren't without their road bumps.

 

[clancey]

No it will just be for transporting smaller products for now to different locations for pickup like a UPS. service..clancey

 

[DeadTreeBurner]

Note that the battery pack in the United planes will be modular and leased. An end of life a recycling plan will be in place. And also note they do not expect the planes to be certified until 2026.

I'll believe it when I see it. Plastics have been around for how long? We still haven't gotten that figured out yet. Recycling is expensive for many types of materials, requires lots of energy and also results in pollutants that are difficult to deal with. I think that glass, paper products, and separated metals are really all that's cost effective to bother with. Historically we've shipped all the other crap to other countries and it's been devastating for communities nearby these recycling centers.
We're not there, and I'm not holding my breath that we will get there. At least in time for there not to be significant consequences.

Science | AAAS

www.sciencemag.org

In the meantime we're shutting down fossil fuel powered power plants when parts of the country are telling people to severely limit power usage to avoid blackouts. Brilliant.

 

[EbS-P]

It’s all about energy densities. Currently battery tech is close. Think 100 mile range. Increase that by a factor of 10 with a new battery module. And you have ha winning platform. FFA is going through some an interesting period. The 737 max flight control software issue is a turning point. They are now the most important software evaluators in the game and it will take time to build that capacity. 2026 is unrealistic unless we increase FAA budget by 2-3 fold. How long did the 373 Max fix take?

just my thoughts. I have no inside information and will happily concede and and all points to anyone with any info to the contrary.
Evan

 

[begreen]

I'll believe it when I see it. Plastics have been around for how long? We still haven't gotten that figured out yet. Recycling is expensive for many types of materials, requires lots of energy and also results in pollutants that are difficult to deal with. I think that glass, paper products, and separated metals are really all that's cost effective to bother with. Historically we've shipped all the other crap to other countries and it's been devastating for communities nearby these recycling centers.
We're not there, and I'm not holding my breath that we will get there. At least in time for there not to be significant consequences.

Science | AAAS

www.sciencemag.org

In the meantime we're shutting down fossil fuel powered power plants when parts of the country are telling people to severely limit power usage to avoid blackouts. Brilliant.

Some parts of the country are dealing with plastics better than others. On the west coast, Recology has worked out some good pipelines for plastic recycling and downcycling. Just because the US has not got it figured out, that doesn't mean there aren't solutions. Europe is way ahead of us there, but they started with producer responsibility laws decades ago. Wherever plastics are produced, they are labeled and tracked. There's a reason why Germany went from ~50000 landfills in 1970 to only 600 now.
As for battery tech, recycling is now becoming part and parcel of design. We should and will get better at this.

 

[DeadTreeBurner]

Some parts of the country are dealing with plastics better than others. On the west coast, Recology has worked out some good pipelines for plastic recycling and downcycling. Just because the US has not got it figured out, that doesn't mean there aren't solutions. Europe is way ahead of us there, but they started with producer responsibility laws decades ago. Wherever plastics are produced, they are labeled and tracked. There's a reason why Germany went from ~50000 landfills in 1970 to only 600 now.
As for battery tech, recycling is now becoming part and parcel of design. We should and will get better at this.

Plastic's dirty little secret is that it never was a great candidate for recycling. And yet the gullible public believed all of the ridiculous ad campaigns to encourage recycling over the years.


I also wouldn't consider Europe anything to brag about.

Europe’s Drive to Slash Plastic Waste Moves Into High Gear

As part of a broader effort to create a circular economy that reduces waste and greenhouse gas emissions, the European Union will ban a host of throwaway plastic items next month and is working to create an expansive and lucrative market for recycled plastics.

e360.yale.edu

The problems with various product's end of life have been around for decades now. I guess it was back in the 90s that e-waste was making headlines. Is most of that being dealt with in a sustainable manner? Or does most of it still end up in landfills if not in some place in China or India? A lot of it was ending up in China where their poor picked through components trying to scavenge worthwhile items. There used to be places to drop off old electronics where I'm at, but that's gone by the wayside. Just throw it in the trash. Compact florescent light bulbs with their small amounts of mercury were also thrown in the trash. Now the "long life" LEDs are proving to not last as long as they were originally touted to last, mainly b/c of planned obsolescence. And they are being thrown into the landfills in larger numbers now that they are the mainstay.

Hazardous batteries have been filling landfills for what, at least two decades now? All the mobile phones, and scads of personal devices have been filling landfills for a long time now, even if some percentage of the devices are "recycled", whatever that means. So as far as I'm concerned, we should have been better at this, globally, DECADES ago. Yet here we are, a day late and a dollar short as we are pushing EVs hard.

Who's being honest and transparent about all the very real problems and costs surrounding green energy? Those pushing it don't want to talk about it. And the public finds out in bits and pieces after the fact.

 

[DeadTreeBurner]

By equating energy budgets in production and life-time use with a political line of thought you've provided sufficient reasons to ignore that remark...

Believe what you will, ignore what you want. Green energy and most everything has been not only politicized, but weaponized.
Green energy and green tech comes with it's own host of problems that the cheerleaders don't want the general public to know about.

 

[clancey]

They are all lying sacks of s--- everyone of them especially the news media..people really need to wake up and pay attention.. clancey