World's first commercial solar aircraft aims for the Stratosphere

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By Matthew Griffin Future Transport 22nd July 2018

WHY THIS MATTERS IN BRIEF

Tomorrow’s aircraft will be battery powered, but future generations of aircraft could do away with the batteries entirely.

While Elon Musk is invested in getting humans to different places, whether it’s from one side of the planet to the other in rocketships, or to Mars, also in rocketships, at breakneck speeds using unbelievable technologies, there may be one day where we circumvent this Earth of ours without using a single drop of fuel, using planes that are powered by electricity, such as the ones being designed right now by Airbus, Boeing, Rolls Royce, Wright Electric, and Zunum Aero, who want to be the “Tesla of the skies,” and not fossil fuels.

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SolarStratos is also a company with the same ambition and they’ve created a manned aerial vehicle with a two person capacity, an incredibly large wingspan, and the ability to completely run on nothing but solar power, so much so that it doesn’t have any fuel on board at all – nothing, not one drop. Oil barons feel free to look away now and cry into your mountains of dwindling cash.

SolarStratos aims for the heavens

The massive wingspan has a twofold purpose. It not only enables the plane to fly without using as much propelling power, but it also comes with solar panels mounted all over it.

The Switzerland based company’s plane has already set records for being the first solar powered airplane to reach heights of 25,000 meters, and made from custom as well as off the shelf parts, the SolarStratos plane comes with an Austrian made 20 kWh battery, solar panels from California based SunPower, and given the heights it reaches, the pilots will be clad in specially designed pressurized spacesuits made by Russian company Zvezda.

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SolarStratos’s founder Raphaël Domjan hopes to develop a technology that can battle climate change and champion solar power over high octane fuel. Once the technology is proven to work, the company aims to build a 3 manned vehicle too that will include a pressurised cabin and will operate commercial space tourism flights as soon as 2021.

Matthew Griffin / About Author

Matthew Griffin, multi-award winning Futurist and named Futurist of the Year 2024, has been described as a "Walking encyclopaedia of the future" by NASA and a futurist polymath. One of the world's most renowned futurists and strategic foresight experts Matthew is the 15 times author of the blockbuster "Codex of the Future" series, and is the Founder and Futurist in Chief of the 311 Institute, a global Futures and Deep Futures advisory firm working across the next 50 years, XPotential University, the world's first free futures and foresight university, and the World Futures Forum which works with the United Nations to solve the worlds greatest challenges. Matthew is an in demand international keynote, acclaimed university lecturer and mentor, and host of the hit Fanatical Futurist podcast.

A rare talent in his past Matthew helped build and run several multi-billion dollar business units for Atos, Dell-EMC, and IBM, and his ability to identify, track, and explain the impacts of hundreds of emerging technologies and trends on global business, culture, and society has earned him a powerful reputation and a roster of clients that include royal households, world leaders, G7, G20, and G77+ governments, and many of the world's most respected brands including ABB, Accenture, Adidas, AON, ARM, BCG, Centrica, Citi Group, Coca Cola, Dentons, Deloitte, Disney, Dow, EY, KPMG, Lego, Legal & General, LinkedIn, Microsoft, PepsiCo, Qualcomm, RWE, Samsung, T-Mobile, UBS, VISA, and many others. He was also the only futurist invited to talk at the UN COP28 held in Dubai alongside world leaders.

Regularly featured in the global media including the AP, BBC, Bloomberg, CNBC, Discovery, Forbes, Khaleej Times, Telegraph, TIME, ViacomCBS, WIRED, and the WSJ, Matthews mission is to help organisations create a fair and sustainable future whose benefits are shared by everyone irrespective of their ability, background, or circumstances.