[QUOTE=43Inches;11100197]Guess we should just convert all the city trains and trams to diesel then.
That's like saying there's no point going to mars until we develop faster than light travel to make it quick. Technology does not advance without purpose, so waiting until you have perfect conditions for the technology to start developing it means you start years behind where you could be.
Now we all know the issues like an electric train running off coal fired generators. Does not mean there are additional benefits, like that pollution can be limited to one area rather than distributed around where you live by smaller less efficient personal systems, also easier to capture and prevent release of polution from a large static power plant than individual mass produced especially mobile units. Also electrical power does not really care for altitude etc, not so much reliance on optimal altitudes and optimal ranges. The example of the aircraft waiting in line for take off, the electric engines just switch off and don't consume any power, yeah some power is still drained by AC and fans and system but this is minute compared the energy an idling turbine consumes.
Simplistic arguments of electric vs fossil fuel is not possible as there are vast differences of operation between the two technologies.
The main hindrance to electric vehicles in general is weight and volume of batteries required to make range effective. As that is solved the technology will flourish and not just from ecological point of view but they are far cheaper to run.[/
The topic is about COMMERCIAL exploitation of electric airliners not research comparable to journeys to Mars, it’s going to be decades before we see airliners powered by COMMERCIAL renewable fuel.