Airbus E-Fan

Pipistrel is also working on an electric trainer [0], but has side by side seating which imo is better for instruction. Like the e-fan it has 172 like performance.

What is truly painful about the 172 is how an inefficient 60's airframe is still the goto choice for flight schools and first plane buyers. A modern 2 seat motor glider / LSA can be 1.5x faster, have double the range with an engine of half the power and fuel consumption. Also, that fuel is unleaded (avgas is leaded).

The lead issue has also spurred the development of turbo diesel aviation engines [1], which run on the more energy dense jet fuel.

There is hope that these next gen airframes and engines will lead to personal two and four seaters with mpg on par with sedans. Unfortunately though in aviation energy density is critical, and whilst there may be an argument for hybrid systems with an electric boost during climb, I don't think we will see electric personal craft in the near future. See Cafe for more on the state of electric craft [2].

[0] http://www.pipistrel.si/plane/wattsup/overview [1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wilksch_WAM_series [2] http://cafefoundation.org

Just as Airbus was completing plans for its successful crossing of the English Channel in an electric airplane Thursday, it appears as though it got beat to the punch by French pilot Hugues Duval flying an electric powered CRI-CRI Cristaline twin. Duval completed the flight Thursday evening, even though authorities attempted to block it:

http://www.avweb.com/avwebflash/news/Did-Duwal-Beat-Airbus-A...

can they possibly give it a less sexy name?