Fuel economics of battery-powered airplanes

[dtilque]

A recent thread on electric airplanes which covers a wide range of the factors.

Electric airplanes

NASA is experimenting with an electric airplane, the X-57 Maxwell. It has several changes that should make it more efficient than just replacing the engines and fuel tanks with electric motors and batteries. They’re taking their time on studying it, making only one change at a time, so it’s going to be a while before they get done. Assuming these experiments all work out the way they expect and adding in other ways to make airplanes lighter (e.g. carbon fiber fuselage and wings), how good of an…