National Geographic’s October issue focusses on the future of electric travel

The October issue of National Geographic focusses on ‘the greening of transportation’, with two separate lead-features on the future of electric land travel and the future of electric air travel. The articles hone-in on what each industry is doing to make transportation greener, including fast-tracking the sale and manufacturing of electric vehicles and redesigning commercial planes to emit less carbon emissions.

Authors Craig Welch and Sam Howe Verhovek are both experts in their fields,with Welch serving as an environmental reporter for over 14 years and Verhovek having previously written a book on the progress of flight in the 20th Century. The features and topics explored provide readers the chance to learn more about how exactly transportation via planes and cars is rapidly changing for the better, at a time when the world begins to eye business and consumer travel again following the Covid-19 pandemic. 

Inclusive within the package is a comprehensive graphic that maps electric vehicle sales in the US, as well as charging port locations and the breakdown of pricing associated with electric vehicle batteries per mile, as well as a rarely-seen prototype design of the next generation of aircraft, illustrating the “Flying V” that is designed to run on jet fuel OR hydrogen (which would yield no carbon emission).

Other key points include: 

  • The UK’s announcement to ban the sale of new passenger vehicles powered solely by gas or diesel will be by 2035 or sooner
  • Ford pledges it’s passenger vehicles in Europe will be all EV’s or hybrids in 5 years, and all electric by 2030
  • Fedex announces plans to go electric and UPS purchases 10,000 EV delivery vans
  • Commercial aviation generally accounts for about 2.5% of all human induced Carbon Dioxide emissions
  • For airplanes, no battery in existence (yet) will be able to power a commercial flight – it would take “the juice of 4.4 million laptop batteries just to get airborne.” Nat Geo dives into how we make this industry more sustainable

 You can find out more about the features, which are also available online, here

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