Those who say the solar industry has taken off probably don’t mean it literally. But thanks to Swiss adventurer Bertrand Piccard, there may be  a new factual meaning to what has been, to this point, just a metaphor.

Piccard and his partners have successfully completed a test run of the Solar Impulse, a solar-powered airplane that is the first of its kind to grace the skies by using renewable energy. As we told you when the news first broke, the plane’s wings are covered with 12,000 solar cells pouring energy into four electric motors.

The aircraft has batteries that let it hit the skies at night, but the Solar Impulse would likely create a traffic jam in mid-air, only being able to hit 44 mph. Still the Swiss team says that by 2012, their solar plane–whose carbon fiber body weighs no more than a midsize car and has the wingspan of a 747–will fly around the globe to prove to skeptics that renewable energy can fill the polluting shoes of fossil fuels.