In order to provide extra lift and allow take-offs and landings from short runways, it would also have a triple-level wing. This would give it a passing resemblance to a World War One fighter, despite having state-of-the-art aerodynamics.
The company's chief executive, Neil Cloughley, argues that such a plane would have far fewer moving parts than a conventional propeller aircraft, making it cheaper to run. It would also be much quieter and produce fewer emissions. "Why do we not use aeroplanes like we would a bus?" he asks.
"The reason is cost of operation, primarily." Also, if you start using lots of aeroplanes, it creates a lot of noise, and of course, we have now got into an age where sustainability really is a key part of our future.
"So we decided we would come up with an aircraft that would not only be economical to use, and therefore cost-effective, but would also be quiet and sustainable." "Why do we not use aeroplanes like we would a bus?" asks Faradair chief executive Neil Cloughley.
The Faradair design, he says, would allow short hops between cities such as London and Manchester for £25 each way—less than the cost of a rail ticket.
In more remote or inaccessible regions, meanwhile, such planes could provide a transport lifeline from small airstrips, avoiding the need for major investments in road or rail lines.
Faradair is far from alone in seeing the potential of electric aviation at a time when governments around the world are searching for ways to reduce carbon emissions. Nor is its project the most ambitious.
The California-based start-up Wright Electric, for example, plans to bring a fully-electric 100-seat aircraft into service by the middle of the decade. It would be based on the existing Bae146, with its four turbofan engines replaced by electric motors.
The company, which has a partnership with Easyjet, says the aircraft would be used to carry out one-hour flights, allowing them to serve routes such as London-Paris, New York-Washington or Hong Kong-Taipei. However, in testing, the plane will run as a hybrid. Initially, just one of the four engines will be replaced by an electric motor, with others following if the tests are successful.
According to Wright Electric's chief executive, Jeffrey Engler, potential customers think this is a good approach and one they could also follow when the aircraft enters production.
"When we spoke to the airlines, they said, 'Well, why don't you go hybrid initially, instead of full electric from the start?'" he explains.
"Just like the car industry started with hybrids as well." So that's something we're looking into. "
The main reason electrifying aircraft is so difficult is that even the best batteries contain far less energy per kilogramme than traditional aviation fuels, making them much too heavy to power an airliner over long distances.
The Alice, a nine-seater plane being developed by Israeli firm Eviation, would fit into this category. The aircraft, which has been under development for several years, has been designed to fly up to 600 miles, purely on electric power.
In 2017, the company began developing a prototype hybrid plane, the E-Fan X, in partnership with Rolls-Royce and Siemens. Like Wright Electric's project, it was based on the existing Bae146.
But three years later, the programme was cancelled. Dr Sandra Bour-Schaeffer, the chief executive of Airbus Upnext, the division responsible for researching new technologies, thinks it was the right decision.
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