Today – up to about 19:30 – the prototype will slowly ascend to an altitude of 8,500 meters, while at the same time charging its batteries in preparation for the night flight. When the suns rays stop being strong enough to supply the solar cells (about two hours before sunset) with energy, says the company, the HB-SIA will start a slow descent, reaching an altitude of around 1,500 meters by 23:00.
It should then carry on flying, using the energy stored in its batteries, until the next sunrise. The big question, it continues, is whether the pilot can make efficient use of the battery energy to fly throughout the night. If this mission is successful, it will be the longest and highest flight ever made by a solar plane.
For seven years now, the whole team has been passionately working to achieve this first decisive step of the project, said André Borschberg CEO and co-founder of the project a few minutes before easing himself into the cockpit.
The intention of this mission is to demonstrate the potential of renewable energy and clean technologies and to promote them amongst the public, added Bertrand Piccard, initiator and president of Solar Impulse.
Popular content
This content is protected by copyright and may not be reused. If you want to cooperate with us and would like to reuse some of our content, please contact: editors@pv-magazine.com.
Share
Becky Beetz
By submitting this form you agree to pv magazine using your data for the purposes of publishing your comment.
Your personal data will only be disclosed or otherwise transmitted to third parties for the purposes of spam filtering or if this is necessary for technical maintenance of the website. Any other transfer to third parties will not take place unless this is justified on the basis of applicable data protection regulations or if pv magazine is legally obliged to do so.
You may revoke this consent at any time with effect for the future, in which case your personal data will be deleted immediately. Otherwise, your data will be deleted if pv magazine has processed your request or the purpose of data storage is fulfilled.
Further information on data privacy can be found in our Data Protection Policy.