In Greek mythology, Icarus, imprisoned along with his father Daedalus, tried to escape from Greece with the help of wings made of feathers stuck to a wooden frame with wax. His father, who made the wings, warned him not to fly too close to the sun, as the wax would melt with the heat. Icarus, though, was so delighted with his ability to fly that he ignored the warnings and fell to his death, into the sea, as the wax melted.

Today, if you want to fly, the sun is no longer an enemy but an asset. On Friday, May 13, 2011, a solar powered plane made a historic international flight, a world first, fuelled by solar energy alone.

The Solar Impulse HB-SIA took 12 hours and 59 minutes to cover the journey from Payerne, Switzerland to Brussels, Belgium. Using no fuel, only solar energy, the flight demonstrates the potential to harness this largely untapped reserve of energy for transport. Will cars and trains be next?

The company is the brainchild of Bertrand Piccard, psychiatrist and aeronaut, (who made the first non-stop round-the-world balloon flight), and André Borschberg, a fighter pilot and a professional airplane and helicopter pilot.

The Solar Impulse is not the first solar powered plane, though. According to the company’s official website , these planes have been around since the 1970s. In 1981, the ‘Solar Challenger’ flew over the English Channel followed by the ‘Sunseeker’ crossing the United States in 1990 (it took two months and twenty-one stages, though!). In July 2010, the Solar Impluse made a successful night flight – the first time a manned solar airplane flew through the night.

The airline industry contributes to about three percent of global greenhouse gas emissions. This, according to the UNEP (United Nations Environment Program), is as much as that of Africa. Solar-powered planes will help reduce this skewed contribution.

While this is cause for celebration, don’t cancel your airline tickets yet. In a ‘regular’ aircraft, an average flight from Geneva to Brussels takes about an hour as opposed to the almost-thirteen-hour flight on the Impulse. Solar-powered technology in its current state is good for lightweight aircraft only.

As far as the Solar Impulse goes, a larger model of the plane is scheduled to be released in 2013. Then, plans are afoot to attempt the crossing of the Atlantic and an around-the-world-flight in five stages in 2012/13. The team is also working on improving the battery storage capacity of the aircrafts, which will reduce the aircraft weight and should eventually allow two pilots to be on board for long-haul flights.

It has taken eight years, 90 million euros and several prototypes to get this far. Whether the sun can power a 747 is the stuff of science fiction right now, as the Solar Impulse team themselves admit. We need this sliver of hope, though – that we will be able to find alterative means of energy to save our planet from destruction. For now, the world is rejoicing along with the team at Solar Impulse. Friday the 13th was a good day to be up with the clouds.

Icarus would have liked to have been there, too.