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British automaker Rolls Royce’s first electric aircraft made its maiden flight on Saturday. Rolls Royce’s first electric plane, called the “Spirit of innovation”, flew for about 15 minutes into the UK skies.
This single-seater aircraft uses a 6000-cell battery with a three-engine powertrain that currently delivers 400 kilowatts (over 500 horsepower). Rolls-Royce said the aircraft would eventually reach speeds of over 300 MPH.
Rolls Royce said its aircraft – dubbed “the spirit of innovation” is one way the company is helping decarbonize critical parts of the global economy.
Warren East, CEO of Rolls-Royce, said: “We are focused on producing the technological breakthroughs society needs to decarbonize air, land and sea transportation, and seize the economic opportunity of the transition to net zero. . It’s not just about breaking a world record; the advanced battery and propulsion technology developed for this program has interesting applications for the urban air mobility market and can help make ‘jet zero’ a reality.
The company said the spirit of innovation is the result of a program called ACCEL, or Accelerating the Electrification of Flight. The other partners of the initiative are YASA and Electroflight. YASA is a wholly owned subsidiary of Mercedes-Benz.
Nowadays, several aviation companies are exploring the possibility of manufacturing electric planes, since air transport and freight are responsible for a greater amount of carbon emissions.
According to the International Energy Agency, carbon dioxide emissions from aviation reached nearly one metric gigatonne in 2019, accounting for about 2.8% of global CO2 emissions from the combustion of fossil fuels.
Last September, a hydrogen fuel cell plane capable of carrying passengers flew over England on its maiden flight.
In 2016, the Solar Impulse 2, a pilot plane powered by the sun, managed to fly around the world without using fuel.
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