Originally Posted by olandese_volante
Whether we like it or not, it is likely that someday in the not-too-far future we're going to have to cut back on the Jet A-1.
Airships, with their large surface area, are a good candidate for practical solar powered flight. Note that the ceiling of the Airlander (20,000 ft) would allow it to fly well above average cloud cover, allowing mostly unrestricted access to sunlight on a few thousand square meters of solar cells.
(SLF - revisiting my ridiculed post in the solar impulse thread)
Actually - the area of the Airlander 10 is nearly 4000 m^2. This, covered in solar cells at 30% efficiency is nearly enough to run its engines at full power. (4x365hp vs. 1200kW of solar power)
I admit, these numbers are over simplified, neither do I have an idea of the mass of that many solar cells, but I suspect a larger Airlander 50 will have more area and more lifting capabilities, so it might be feasible to build a craft whose loiter time is not defined by fuel or FTL but when the crew needs to go on vacation or their tour of duty ends. ;-)
I think there are solar cells out there that sacrifice some efficiency for massive reductions in weight, they might be the right thing for this application. Someone in this thread wrote they're thinking about shutting down half of the engines during cruise - maybe, talking about lighter electric motors, there is a realistic chance that the two usually shut down engines might also be replaced by two electrics plus some batteries?
What do you all think?