4 ms·

I wonder what the life of the aircraft needs to be before the higher cost of the aircraft amortises into lower overall costs. I'd imagine that the running cost

I wonder what the life of the aircraft needs to be before the higher cost of the aircraft amortises into lower overall costs. I'd imagine that the running cost of a mainly solid state aircraft is significantly lower than a gasoline one, but the initial battery cost will be very significant. It would be nice if the rise of electric general aviation has the effect of reducing the cost of flying. However, I suspect then you'll run into other issues. I can't imagine LA can have too many air taxis flying around before they become a nightmare to manage. If the hourly cost of an air taxi is low enough that everyone can take one, the sky will become saturated. There's obviously a lot of space, but our systems for managing air traffic right now are designed around there being tens to hundreds of aircraft in the same area, not thousands. We'd need to introduce fully automated aircraft routing to have a hope of dealing with air taxis over dense cities if they became remotely popular.

rbanffy 7y ago
Being simpler than turboprop or piston, I assume maintenance is cheaper. That has a long term impact as airframes are used for decades before being deemed uneconomical or otherwise unfit for purpose. Battery prices can be offset by cheaper electricity and/or carbon taxes. Less noisy planes should also be able to operate in areas jets aren't, such as extremely desirable urban centers. eVTOL is even better in that, but developments that would make it rival fixed wing are coming, eventually. If a V-22 can do it, so can civilians. ATC is the choking point - we'll have to take a lesson from the phone system, which transitioned from having human operators routing calls to all of us recognizing dial-busy-ring tones and being able to dial numbers ourselves.
- aedocw 7y ago
  No one who has ever flown a plane in moderately busy airspace (like desirable urban centers) would talk about transitioning ATC to something without humans. As it stands, in non-controlled airspace, it already works like this. Pilots announce their intentions and coordinate with each other. This only works in areas with very low traffic.
  - rbanffy 7y ago
    Nobody would suggest human coordination in this scenario. It's more like machines negotiating directly or assisting the negotiation so that all craft in the given volume agree on what it looks like and what it'll be in the next few minutes. There are some very interesting research topics in there in how to achieve this distributed consensus and how to deal with malicious actors trying to disrupt the air traffic in the region.
radicalbyte 7y ago
I can't see how they compete when electricity is taxed whilst aviation fuel is untaxed.
- benj111 7y ago
  Why should tax inherently make it uncompetitive? Has untaxed rooftop solar always been cheaper than some other taxed energy source?
- sokoloff 7y ago
  Airline fuel is largely untaxed, but most other aviation fuel is taxed. General aviation 100LL ("avgas") fuel is taxed federally at $0.191/gallon (or $0.335/gallon for certain ownership structures). General aviation jet fuel is taxed at $0.219 (to as much as $0.244) per gallon. Highway fuel is taxed federally at $0.184/gallon (slightly less than avgas). Electric aircraft are not poised to disrupt the jet-fuel burning sector of aviation. The aircraft in this article will be competing against aircraft using taxed fuel (100LL).
  - iancmceachern 7y ago
    Why is airline fuel untaxed?
    - sokoloff 7y ago
      I assume because the feds calculated that they can collect more revenue by taxing elements of the tickets rather than the fuel, but I really don't know. (Note that some states do tax airline jet fuel and some airports assess a flowage fee per gallon [which is for practical purposes equivalent to a sales tax].)
      - benj111 7y ago
        Airline jet fuel duty is covered by international agreements I think, presumably to facilitate trade. I don't know if that also applies to purely domestic use though. Maybe that's how states can impose a tax?

rbanffy 7y ago

Being simpler than turboprop or piston, I assume maintenance is cheaper. That has a long term impact as airframes are used for decades before being deemed uneconomical or otherwise unfit for purpose. Battery prices can be offset by cheaper electricity and/or carbon taxes. Less noisy planes should also be able to operate in areas jets aren't, such as extremely desirable urban centers. eVTOL is even better in that, but developments that would make it rival fixed wing are coming, eventually. If a V-22 can do it, so can civilians. ATC is the choking point - we'll have to take a lesson from the phone system, which transitioned from having human operators routing calls to all of us recognizing dial-busy-ring tones and being able to dial numbers ourselves.

aedocw 7y ago
No one who has ever flown a plane in moderately busy airspace (like desirable urban centers) would talk about transitioning ATC to something without humans. As it stands, in non-controlled airspace, it already works like this. Pilots announce their intentions and coordinate with each other. This only works in areas with very low traffic.
- rbanffy 7y ago
  Nobody would suggest human coordination in this scenario. It's more like machines negotiating directly or assisting the negotiation so that all craft in the given volume agree on what it looks like and what it'll be in the next few minutes. There are some very interesting research topics in there in how to achieve this distributed consensus and how to deal with malicious actors trying to disrupt the air traffic in the region.

radicalbyte 7y ago

I can't see how they compete when electricity is taxed whilst aviation fuel is untaxed.

benj111 7y ago
Why should tax inherently make it uncompetitive? Has untaxed rooftop solar always been cheaper than some other taxed energy source?
sokoloff 7y ago
Airline fuel is largely untaxed, but most other aviation fuel is taxed. General aviation 100LL ("avgas") fuel is taxed federally at $0.191/gallon (or $0.335/gallon for certain ownership structures). General aviation jet fuel is taxed at $0.219 (to as much as $0.244) per gallon. Highway fuel is taxed federally at $0.184/gallon (slightly less than avgas). Electric aircraft are not poised to disrupt the jet-fuel burning sector of aviation. The aircraft in this article will be competing against aircraft using taxed fuel (100LL).
- iancmceachern 7y ago
  Why is airline fuel untaxed?
  - sokoloff 7y ago
    I assume because the feds calculated that they can collect more revenue by taxing elements of the tickets rather than the fuel, but I really don't know. (Note that some states do tax airline jet fuel and some airports assess a flowage fee per gallon [which is for practical purposes equivalent to a sales tax].)
    - benj111 7y ago
      Airline jet fuel duty is covered by international agreements I think, presumably to facilitate trade. I don't know if that also applies to purely domestic use though. Maybe that's how states can impose a tax?