NASA Offers $1.5 Million For 200MPG Aircraft

coondoggie writes to mention that NASA's Green Flight Challenge is offering up to $1.5 million for an aircraft that can hit 200 passenger miles per gallon while maintaining 100 mph on a 200 mile flight. "The Challenge is intended to bring about the development and convergence of new technologies and innovations that can improve the community acceptance, efficiency, door-to-door speed, utility, environmental-friendliness, affordability and safety of future air vehicles, CAFÉ stated. Such technologies and innovations include, but are not limited to, bio-fueled propulsion, breakthroughs in batteries, motors, fuel-cells and ultra-capacitors that enable electric-powered flight, advanced high lift technologies for very short takeoff and landing distances, ultra-quiet propellers, enhanced structural efficiency by advances in material science and nano-technology and safety features such as vehicle parachutes and air-bags."

Re:It is called high speed train

[JesseL]

When your train flies.

Re:A-380 halfway there

[nizo]

Wait I just realized, if you are allowed to use passengers as fuel using obese people might be better after all.

Re:Misunderstanding?

[nizo]

If you only have one passenger and are going 200 miles on one gallon, probably nothing.

Re:A-380 halfway there

[PotatoFarmer]

I don't see any rules requiring a safe landing either. I wonder how large a trebuchet I could make for less than $1.5m...

Re:Trains lack flexibility

[nutshell42]

Lets propose we could actually build such a network, it would most likely be a hub and spoke arrangement.

Yeah, thank god noone in the airline industry ever heard of the term "hub and spoke". Can you imagine, hours of layovers or racing from one end of a mega terminal to the other because you have to get a "connecting flight". Not to mention the endless possibilities for the airline to lose your luggage.

Thankfully, all that remains firmly in the realm of fantasy.

Re:It is called high speed train

[OnlyPostsWhilstDrunk]

Only if it can be turtles all the way down from there

Re:I can do it, but I'm broke

[Anonymous Coward]

A prop and wheels would also be nice

Follow the Hotrod Example

[Anonymous Coward]

Put big wheels on the back and a small wheels on the front so it's always rolling downhill. Great for fuel economy!

Re:A-380 halfway there

[keefus_a]

Yes, I can see it now. One hundred doctors and 100 obese patients, using the jet engine intake for their magical liposuction wands. Is fat combustible?

Captain: I'm sorry. We don't have enough fuel for this much cargo.
Doctor: Oh don't worry. We will by the time we get there.