Article ID | Journal | Published Year | Pages | File Type |
---|---|---|---|---|
5012854 | Energy Conversion and Management | 2017 | 11 Pages |
Abstract
Renewable energy system is very critical for solving the energy problem of a long endurance stratospheric airship. Output performance of the traditional solar array fixed on the upper surface of the airship remains to be improved to reduce the area and weight of renewable energy system. Inspired by the solar tracking system and kirigami, a rotatable renewable energy system (mainly including solar array) is designed to improve the current status of the energy system. The advantages of the rotatable solar array are studied using a MATLAB computer program based on the theoretical model established in this paper. The improvements in output energy and required area of the solar array were compared between the traditional airship and improved one. Studies had shown that the rotatable renewable energy system made the total weight of energy system decreased by 1000Â kg when the maximum design speed of the airship was greater than 22Â m/s. The results demonstrate that the rotatable renewable energy system for the airship can be a good way to improve the output performance of solar array, and the conceptual design and theoretical model suggest a pathway towards solving the energy problem of a stratospheric airship.
Related Topics
Physical Sciences and Engineering
Energy
Energy (General)
Authors
Mingyun Lv, Jun Li, Weiyu Zhu, Huafei Du, Junhui Meng, Kangwen Sun,