Are e-aircraft the future?
With electric cars a growing presence on the roads, how about aircraft becoming cleaner too? "Alice" has a range of over 400 miles with her two motors. Major logistics companies are already taking an active interest.
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00:00 This is no ordinary aircraft preparing for takeoff in the US state of Washington.
00:05 It's powered by two electric motors, which means that flights have zero emissions and are quiet.
00:12 Alice can carry nine passengers plus baggage or just over one ton of cargo.
00:19 It has a range of 400 kilometers.
00:22 For the man at the helm of the company that built Alice, this electric plane is hopefully the start of a revolution in aviation.
00:30 Half of all of the world's air traffic is actually made of flights that are 500 nautical miles or less.
00:39 But a full 20 to 30 percent is 250 nautical miles or less.
00:43 So it means that there's a tremendous market for Alice and its capabilities.
00:47 Aviation has been inundated with orders and inquiries since the successful maiden voyage in September 2022,
00:55 with Alice securing over $5 billion in contracts.
00:59 That flourishing business is also due to the growing weight of climate and environmental issues,
01:04 and not just since the Fridays for Future movement hit the headlines.
01:09 For years now, the aviation industry has been facing growing criticism and pressure.
01:15 So with airlines around the world stepping up efforts to become more energy efficient and climate friendly,
01:21 Alice has arrived right on time.
01:24 Short-haul aviation's dirty little secret is that it's actually the most polluting form of travel in the world.
01:31 So carbon dioxide per passenger mile from a short-haul flight is, again, it's as bad as it gets.
01:38 With Alice, we're taking that and completely inverting it, because with Alice there are no specific emissions.
01:43 Nothing comes out of the airplane. No carbon, no exhaust, and very little noise.
01:49 An aircraft with zero emissions and minimal noise is certainly an attractive prospect for cargo operators such as DHL.
01:57 The logistics giant has a fleet of several hundred planes ferrying packets and parcels around the world via its intercontinental network of air hubs.
02:10 Stephanie Lotter is in charge of global air fleet planning at DHL.
02:15 Alice was an immediate no-brainer for her, not least with DHL having committed to making operations carbon neutral by 2050.
02:24 Alice essentially comes with a range of 460 kilometers and a payload of 1,200 kilos.
02:33 So it equates to the smallest feeder aircraft that we operate in our network today.
02:38 And so it's an ideal fit. We don't have to think about it.
02:44 We can simply deploy it where the fuel-burning aircraft flies today, Alice will fly in the future.
02:52 Everything else stays the same.
02:54 DHL primarily uses those smaller aircraft for flights in the US and the Caribbean, where they connect the big air hubs with smaller local airports.
03:04 It's in such remote areas that electric aircraft boast a major advantage.
03:09 Due to both zero emissions and above all minimal noise pollution, an issue that has in many cases led to night flight bans.
03:17 Stephanie Lotter at least wasted no time getting DHL on board.
03:21 The company has already ordered 12 cargo versions of Alice, scheduled to take to the skies in 2027.
03:29 The most logical step for us was to deploy Alice where it gets certified, namely in the United States.
03:35 There are two of our regional hubs in the States. One is near the Los Angeles area, the other one in California, the other one is in Georgia, Atlanta, Georgia.
03:48 Back at aviation headquarters in Arlington in the state of Washington, the team are currently discussing new improvements to Alice's engines.
03:57 Customers' requests and requirements have been constantly fed into the evolution of Alice, says CEO Gregory Davis.
04:05 And having a heavyweight like DHL seeing the aircraft's potential years ahead of its certification has been a real boon.
04:14 Having DHL come in as one of our launch customers actually demonstrated not just to ourselves but also to the marketplace
04:22 that there is a real interest in this aircraft and in the applications that we're designing it for.
04:27 And we've been able to leverage that relationship not just for the learning but also to help expand our market presence.
04:33 And that's helped us build up to what is now an order book of $5 billion.
04:40 Alice's debut flight in 2022 was also the big takeoff for her maker.
04:46 There is no end in sight to the queue of new clients and a growing number of investors interested in the technology.
04:56 Steve Crane had years of experience test flying new planes for Boeing before he joined aviation.
05:02 And an electric aircraft, he says, is a very different beast.
05:06 And not just because the motors respond far faster than conventional kerosene-powered engines.
05:12 But will the wider world share his enthusiasm?
05:16 That's interesting. Are people afraid of transitioning to an electric aircraft?
05:22 I would think the public is ready for it.
05:25 I mean, you see all the electric vehicles that are out on the market.
05:28 The auto industry as a whole going to electric, I think you're going to see a lot more acceptance from just vehicles on the ground, cars to aircraft.
05:38 It's just once people are exposed to that, I think the comfort level goes up.
05:43 A decisive factor in the prospects for electric aircraft like Alice will be the batteries.
05:49 Technical improvements would give the planes a longer range and higher payload.
05:54 And therefore a wider scope of deployment too.
05:58 It's kind of, it's form-fitting. The batteries, these panels come off and they're modular.
06:03 They go right underneath from here all the way to here are the batteries.
06:09 You have a left side and you have a right side.
06:11 And just clam shells and this cover goes right over the top of them.
06:14 That's the high-voltage system, which is running your engines right back there.
06:19 And the battery charging times have gotten shorter.
06:22 It now takes just 30 minutes to provide enough power to reach the next destination on the plane's multi-stop daily schedule.
06:30 How long does it take to fuel an airplane about this size?
06:33 You're still looking at about a 10 or 15 minute evolution.
06:36 You know, you're still pulling the truck up grounding.
06:40 You go to each individual tank or you have a pressure, a single pressure point that you'd apply fuel to.
06:47 It takes a while to fuel an airplane.
06:49 It's a very exciting time in battery development.
06:52 We see new technologies that are coming on are offering quite promising boosts to the energy density of the batteries.
06:58 Going from 275 water per kilogram to 375 to even 500.
07:04 And these are cells that exist today.
07:07 A development that DHL is following closely.
07:11 Better batteries leading to an increase in aircraft size, range and maximum load would also enable an expansion of the electric flight network.
07:20 Aviation Chief Gregory Davis is expecting demand to continue growing steadily and is already preparing to take production of ALICE to the next level.
07:30 level.
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