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this post was submitted on 15 Aug 2026
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Now that you mention it, they specify a maximum total weight of 25,000 lbs, so at 100% efficiency it would take 339MJ of energy to lift the fully loaded plane to 10,000 ft. That can be converted as 94 kWh, and at the current cheapest electricity price in the US of $0.1235/kWh, that's $11.63
Therefore, it is literally impossible for this plane to reach 10,000 ft for $5 fully loaded.
Way cheaper than I'd have guessed.
737 at max takeoff weight is 175k lbs. So that's around $80 to get airborne. Seems like a steal when you're charging easily triple that for one seat.
To be clear, this is the theoretical minimum amount of energy to lift a mass straight up. I'd be surprised if an airplane moving sideways would hit even 30% efficiency in comparison.