Droneport in Sint-Truiden, a 30-hectare industry park specifically for aviation, drone, advanced air mobility, and unmanned flight testing, wants to build its own solar park on the nearby site and company buildings. The business park aims to generate its own energy to fly electrically.

An agreement in principle has been reached to launch the solar park project around Droneport, at the site where cars from manufacturer Stellantis are temporarily stored, but also on the roofs of nearby commercial buildings. It is not yet clear how large the solar park in Brustem should be.

‘Electric flying has a future’

The coming months should provide more clarity on the details of the project – its size, capacity, and investment. If everything goes as expected, the solar park could be completed within two years.

Ward Decaluwé, CEO of Droneport in Brustem for two years, is convinced that electric flying has a future. “Ten years ago, people were skeptical about electric driving, but today the breakthrough is a fact. Large airplanes will not be flying electrically for the time being, but for business flights, it should be perfectly possible to fly completely emission-free.”

Living lab

Droneport plans to use its site as a living lab: for alternative propulsion systems (electric, hydrogen, etc.), for autonomous/robotic logistics, and for testing and innovation. The company aims to enable “CO₂-neutral and quiet air transport of both goods and passengers within the next decade.”

A few weeks ago, the Belgian-American start-up Cosmic Aerospace organized the first demonstration flight of a scale model of the Skylark, a new fully electric aircraft.

“This new aircraft concept opens the door to affordable, fast, and sustainable air travel from regional airports,” explains Marshall Gusman, CTO at Cosmic Aerospace. The goal is to achieve a range of 1,000 km with 24 passengers on board for (business) flights between regional airports.