Airborne wind energy (AWE) is a power production technique aiming to harvest energy from high-altitude winds through tethered aircraft. In the ground-based power generation concept, the aircraft flies dynamic trajectories at high flight speeds and lift coefficients, thus creating large lift forces. These forces drive a ground-based generator via a tether, thereby producing energy. The tethered aircraft operates over a wide range of wind speeds, with distinct operating modes. Current rigid-wing AWE aircraft adapt to these conditions by using discrete control surfaces. Morphing wings, in contrast, can adjust to the different flight conditions and operating modes by continuously altering their shape, and thus can increase the power production of AWE systems. This paper presents the modeling of a camber-morphing AWE system, focusing in particular on the coupled aeroelastics and flight dynamics of the aircraft and on the reduced-order structural and aerodynamic model of the morphing wing. The resulting framework allows analysis of the entire AWE system consisting of the aircraft, tether, and ground station. Owing to its high computational efficiency, the model enables comparison of different trajectories and flight control strategies, and it permits identification of optimal aerodynamic- and structural-design parameters of morphing AWE wings.


    Access

    Check access

    Check availability in my library

    Order at Subito €


    Export, share and cite



    Title :

    Reduced-Order Dynamic Model of a Morphing Airborne Wind Energy Aircraft


    Contributors:

    Published in:

    AIAA Journal ; 57 , 8 ; 3586-3598


    Publication date :

    2019-06-12


    Size :

    13 pages




    Type of media :

    Article (Journal)


    Type of material :

    Electronic Resource


    Language :

    English




    Aeroservoelastic Optimization of Morphing Airborne Wind Energy Wings

    Fasel, Urban / Keidel, Dominic / Molinari, Giulio et al. | AIAA | 2019


    Concurrent Design and Flight Mission Optimization of Morphing Airborne Wind Energy Wings

    Fasel, Urban / Tiso, Paolo / Keidel, Dominic et al. | AIAA | 2021


    MORPHING AIRCRAFT

    LIU YANTAO / XU JINGHAI / CAO YUANBAO et al. | European Patent Office | 2021

    Free access

    Morphing aircraft

    OU DI / LIANG WENLONG | European Patent Office | 2015

    Free access

    Development of a Morphing Aircraft Model for Wind Tunnel Experimentation

    Neal, David / Farmer, Justin / Inman, Daniel | AIAA | 2006