French engineers are up for the test flight of a solar blimp dubbed Nephelios. If all goes well, Project Sol’R is hopeful of crossing the English Channel in less than an hour on this zero-emission airship. No solar powered airship has ever crossed the Strait of Dover, mind you! So next time you look skywards, you won’t fail to spot the helium blimp sheathed in solar panels. However, you might need to wait for two weeks at least.
INSA Lyon and ESSEC Business School are leading Project Sol’R wherein they ensure that the 22 meters long blimp does justice to what is expected of it. One of the aims is to prove that the zero CO2 emission flight is actually possible. Nephelios is composed of an aluminum frame and has nylon and polyethylene cover filled with helium. The semi-flexible solar panels generate 2.4 kW that is just sufficient to keep it gliding at 25mph.
Well, it would be interesting to see if it repeats what went before at the Paris Air Show at Le Bourget or betters it in realizing the unachieved (until now).
Image+Source: Wired
