SolarShip: Hybrid Ariships with unlimited range.

A key feature that makes the hybrid airship so attractive is just how little energy is actually needed to get the ship off the ground. It is so little in fact, that one Canadian company is planing to power their new line of Hybrid Airships with the power of the sun alone. Solar Ship will be a small hybrid airship ranging from ultralights to truck size cargo haulers. However, unlike the military hybrid airships coming out later this year that will be powered by diesel fuel, these things will utilize their envelope to collect solar energy to power small electric motors that will push the ship so long as the sun is shining. This gives them unlimited range, at lest during the day.

The inventor is looking to fix the economic situation in Africa. His idea is that with unlimited range, these things can be operated by volunteers who will fly them from anywhere in the world to anywhere else in the world that needs humanitarian aid. He also believes, and I endorse this idea fully, that Africa's stranded of living can be dramatically increased by providing supply routs that utilize airships for year round cargo delivery. With unlimited range and no need to refuel he hopes that it will be easy for Africans who don't have any money to operate supply routs if they are given one of these airship and start making money for themselves immediately.

It's a noble idea, if everything goes according to plan they will fly their first prototype from Canada to Africa in 2013. Let's wish them the best of luck.

Blue Devil is half way there. Will Congress cut LEMV? I sure hope not.

Something big happened in the world of airships today.

The Air force has just completed one of the hardest parts in bringing there big old fashioned blimp into the war in Afghanistan. As you can see, it's quit massive.

Unfortunately, I wish I could say this was good news, but thanks to budgetary concerns created by the corporate oligarchy, the government is looking to cut one of these two big blimp programs. The good news is that the Senate is intelligent enough to mention that the practical applications of LEMV out-wight the practical applications of of Blue Devil. However they are trying to migrate responsibility by appointing someone else to figure out which one of these programs to cut. I sure hope this doesn't lead to the Senate cutting LEMV to fund Blue Devil. That would again be an example of politics ruining good ideas. If any of these programs should be cut, Blue Devil is the one that should get the axe first.

However, Blue Devil is still more useful then all these pointless, stupid, irresponsible wars this country has gotten itself into. Why not cut the 2.3 billion it cost to fund these wars that only create a bigger problem in the end anyway? Or even better why not tax the federal reserve out of existence and get ride of these tyrannical bankers that think they rule the world? Call me a pessimist if you want, but I see a wave of stupidity ahead. Not only will government keep us in these pointless wars forever, but they will probably cut LEMV in favor of Blue Devil because they are ahead.

The idiocy of doing such a thing would be catastrophic to a future globule economy. If LEMV is cut it could mean that Discovery Air will pull it's deal of 3.8 billion for Hybrid Airships. The Hybrid Airship might not ever get off the ground and the idea will go nowhere. Blue Devil will probably crash, because blimps are generally unsafe, and the world will descend into tyranny and the sky will fall.

OK, it might not be that bad, but it could be! Maybe I'm wrong, I sure would like to be.

Airship-Spaceships?

High altitude airships is a concept that is only just being explored, The military is currently investing in platforms that can be taken up to 60,000ft-140,000ft. But what if we could take that even higher, say all the way to space? Sounds impossible, but one small company is looking to change our very idea of what we think is possible.

"Aerospace engineer John Powell has studied this idea since 1979, and in 2008 published floating to space , describing the paradigm in detail. In an interview with Sander Olson, Mr. Powell discusses how his company, JP Aerospace , is actively developing the technologies and capabilities to bring this concept to fruition." (Source)

The idea is to have 2 airships that run out of a station docked at 140,000ft. This station in itself would be an airship, but its only job is to remain at 140,000ft and act as a servicing station between the airships that travel to ground and the airships that travel to space.

The airships that travel to ground would be built of stronger components then the ones that travel to space. Because the airships that travel to space would be so lightweight that they would be destroyed by the winds at normal altitudes. However at post 140,000ft there is no wind to worry about.

It's an interesting concept. They hope that in 20 years they will be able to get cargo into low earth orbit for as little as a dollar a pound. Their airships don't look all that flashy, but who knows, maybe one of these airships will take us to mars in the next 30 years.

and the winner is...

Pipistrel!

Really, this was not a huge surprise after the revelations that only 3 teams had actually made it to the competition and could compete. However what is a surprise is that both of the top 2 got double the millage efficiency that was set by NASA. An unprecedented 400 passenger miles per gallon is really showing that electric flight is the way to go. Nothing we have today is that efficient, it's almost cheaper then riding a bike. If this keeps up, I can just imagine in the near future small electric airplanes that can travel all the way around the world on a single charge.

Undoubtedly, this is a huge step for NASA's Small Aircraft Transpiration System. It now makes economic sense for corporations and governments to invest in such a system. If you needed to go from San Fransisco to Los Angeles the price of taking an Air Taxi survive based on this technology would be cheaper and faster then taking a car, and more convenient then airline travel because, hopefully, there will be no TSA oversight (as it's not really needed). At the same time this type of system is applicable everywhere setting the stage for a worldwide, cheap, economically viable, environmentally friendly transportation system that anyone can afford..

Green Flight Challange update:

Unfortunately, none of the really cool ideas made it to the Green Flight Challenge. Including my winner pick The Synergy, which proved to be over ambitious. Still the contenders that did make it are setting records with their fuel efficiency which could eventually lead to developments in extremely cheep flying.

One thing I do like about airplanes over airships is that they are usually a lot faster and thus the best method of travel when you need to get somewhere fast. That's not really true here however because hybrid airships average about 100knts and these Eco planes average, you guessed it, 100kts. Still the engine efficiency improvements that are being made here would benefit airships too, making them even less expensive to operate then they already are/will be.

Imagine air-buses (not Airbus), airships that can fulfill all the routs of regular commuter buses for the same price. Except they would be able to operate in place like Nepal or Alaska were the terrain is a hazard for everything but hybrid airships. Imagine getting off a cruise liner hoping on an air-bus and taking a 20 minute trip to the top of mount Everest and skiing back down the mountain. Impossible one might say? Not for the Hybrid airship.

And on top of it's already good environmental impact, the environmental impact of replacing buses, trains, trucks, roads with these flying machines can take that even further. Allowing for completely self sustainable oil rigs or mineral mines to be built in places without roads and huge changes to the surrounding ecological area that's caused by the need to get to these places. If you look at logging for example, the biggest environmental damage is caused by the roads that are made to get the trucks into the areas where they need to log. If logging became road-less, the environmental consequences of logging would be decreased.

The more I think about this, the more I realize how much corporations are going to use the Hybrid Airship more and more over other forms of transpiration because it's simply cost productive. It's far more expensive to build these roads then building a small fleet of hybrid airships. But unlike roads the Hybrid Airships can be used again when they discover another natural resource to exploit and decide there's a profit motive in building a facility there.

Depending on your prospective this could be a good and bad thing. Because it allows corporations to exploit areas of the world where natural resources have been and they've know about, but have decided ageist exploiting because they realized it would be too costly to set up the transportation systems to get there. Still it's only good news if you're a fan of airships like me, because you can start to see just how huge Airships can be in the future.