A factor 4 improvement in energy density. Not quite there yet, but a major step in the right direction for aviation. Would prob40 convert the Pipistrel Velis Electro into a viable tourer. Yes, I know, disregarding the electric charging infrastructure currently lacking at airports. Ah well, just make the wings removable, and have a friendly airport employee or fellow pilot tow her to the nearest charging station and all set!
Also safer apparently.
Yes I think there are two remaining obstacles: battery energy density, and charging. I don’t doubt that the 1st one will one day be solved (no engineer/scientist could possibly say “never”) but the 2nd one is very very tricky.
If GA collapsed to “ultralight” types doing short local hops, the 2nd one would be solved too, and you need to only look at Spain or Italy… One is talking about GA changing quite a lot.
The major obstacle with any alternatives to what we have today for light twin and SE GA is the distribution network.
Everyone concentrates first on the technology, but once that is solved the distribution is almost insurmountable be it for hydrogen, charging, SAF Jet-A or Avgas, or even simply 100UL. Time will tell if GAMI and EASA are able to find a solution for G100UL in Europe and that is an easy problem technically, compared to the others. GA is just too small in Europe to justify large investments. Most solutions will likely be quite local and spoty, a bit like the various Mogas implementations across Europe.
One real data point:
From FB: First time flying G-KDKD Velis Electro solo. Landing were ok practicing circuits. To give perspective of range, I was in the air for 34mins and battery was at 49% when landed full stop.
Q: How long does the battery last: about an hour. If you’re super economical, climb only to 1000ft, possibly a little more. Every 1000ft climb uses 7% battery. So I just went to 1000ft and flew around at that. You’re gonna get 70-80nm at a real push, but you need 30% for a go-around. So landing means landing.
45 mins recharge between flights.
We had a French one visit our aerodrome the other day. It was doing a promotion/tour in little 25-35min hops – as you say, flying at 1000ft max. The guys Missus was driving the same route (diesel Peugeot?) and meeting him at each airfield as the vehicle support, because they took out the batteries each evening to re-charge them overnight, taking them to a car-charging station… 
It seems to me that the general interest in electric aircraft is dwindling. Yes, you can make an electric aircraft, and make it fly, but then what? The Velis Electro is as good as it gets, and it’s not a novelty anymore. It demonstrates two things:
I’m afraid the GA electric aircraft is dead by now, and the killer is the Velis Electro. That’s not to say there are some niche applications where electric flight does indeed makes sense also in a practical way, it’s more that electric power will not replace combustion engines for the vast majority of GA anytime soon, if ever. It’s a bit like the flying car: been there, done that, didn’t really work, nor did it make much sense
It all boils down to battery capacity of course. My hopes was that electric propulsion would open up some completely new stuff, but that hasn’t happened either. It’s seems to me that the moment you put a human being into a drone-like configuration, it all becomes just stupid, or terrifying, or insanely complex and inefficient. Ordinary airplanes and helicopters look like designed by a gang of geniuses in comparison.
It has always been our culture to commit to achievable goals with customers and operators, and we intend to keep that promise.
Tecnam by my observation over 20 years has proved itself to be a very astute and grounded player in the GA and LSA market. It does not surprise me to see them publicly cutting through the BS earlier than most.
“we have finally figured out what was obvious all along because, physics. Also, money is getting kinda expensive now so we stopped wasting it”
After Tecnam, now NASA stops its electric plane prototype :
Flightglobal article
