Assessment of All-Electric General Aviation Aircraft

• Main Authors: Jakub Hospodka, Helena Bínová, Stanislav Pleninger
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: MDPI AG 2020-11-01
• Series: Energies
• Subjects: electric propulsion; energy; sustainable aviation; electricity price; operational procedures; general aviation
• Online Access: https://www.mdpi.com/1996-1073/13/23/6206

The purpose of this paper is to describe the upcoming changes that will bring the transition from piston engines to all-electric aircrafts. The article focuses on the differences in operation of small general aviation aircrafts. This topic is timely, as the first all-electric aircraft was certified by the European Union Aviation Safety Agency (EASA) in 2019. As there are no data concerning this new type of operation available, the data have been derived from other applicable sources. At first, we compared the energy consumption of the same aircraft with the piston engine, and then afterwards with the retrofitted all-electric variant. Our results focus on the difference in fuel price, which is discussed in the context of electricity price comparison with AVGAS prices. Moreover, we discuss the environmental impacts, especially concerning electricity source mix and emissions produced (we estimate both with and without life-cycle assessment). In the discussion, we compare the results and identify the benefits of an all-electric solution. Furthermore, several operational restrictions of all-electric aircrafts are discussed.