Solar energy will crack the duration of drones

[China Agricultural Machinery Industry News] With the rapid development of drones in recent years, drones have been widely used in military and civilian fields, especially in the civilian sector, ranging from self-portrait socialization to power inspection. But there is a clear obstacle that hinders its development – ​​the duration of its life.

Solar energy will crack the duration of drones

In November 2016, the Haiying Forum, the China Unmanned System Technology Seminar, was held in Shenzhen, attracting experts and scholars from all over the country engaged in research and development, manufacturing, application services and other industries, as well as technical backbones for the development of the unmanned system industry. And the future analysis of the future and the technical analysis of unmanned system intelligent control.

The main development direction of the development of the technology of the UAV platform

Jiang Hanjie, an engineer at AVIC Aircraft Design and Research Institute, introduced at the forum that the basic characteristics of unmanned aircraft can be summarized as the following five points: long battery life, large flight load, wide range of use, low R&D cost and small aircraft size. To some extent, drone life and load are complementary, and some manufacturers will face a choice between the two, which in turn will affect the realization of the last three points. At present, the UAVs on the market mainly focus on fuel, oil and gas hybrid, electric power and a small part of hydrogen energy, but the air time is still limited, and the operating area is reduced. Therefore, industrial drones are also suppressed to some extent. Industry applications. Therefore, many countries are currently focusing on solar drones flying at the level of the stratosphere. At this level, there is basically no cloud and wind, allowing solar panels to work with higher efficiency. At the same time, the stratosphere is outside the air traffic control area of ​​the ordinary technology, so the route restrictions on the aircraft are also very small.

The huge market for high-altitude long-haul solar drones

At present, industrial-grade drones have gradually made great achievements in smart transportation, agricultural plant protection, electric oil inspection, and land resources mapping. Jiang Hanjie engineer mentioned that the development of the solar-powered UAV platform for high-altitude long-haul is based on the accumulation of key technologies in the UAV platform, the rational development of battery technology development, the comprehensive design of the airborne hardware and software, and the comprehensive protection and cost control innovation. design. Previous UAV solar R&D applications were mainly military services, such as China's Rainbow UAV series and the US Global Hawk high-altitude long-endurance drone. The former stayed longer than 24 hours and the latter achieved 40 hours. Endurance, but with the development of unmanned aircraft and civilians, such as this year's Zhuhai Air Show, China Aerospace and Tianjiao Airlines signed a solar drone application cooperation agreement, will vigorously promote the transformation and application of military technology in the civilian field, also shows high altitude The development of long-haul solar drone technology will become a breakthrough in the development and application of industrial drones in the future.

In 2014, Facebook set up a drone lab to develop the high-altitude solar drone “Aquila”. The goal is to use AUV to use a laser signal transmitter to ensure coverage of a radius of about 50 kilometers and to work continuously for more than three months. In July of this year, Aquila completed the first air show, and in the recent millimeter wave wide-area coverage test, Aquila's entire test process consumes only 105W, and the whole process relies on solar power. The economic benefits of the Solara drone are even more direct: According to Titan Aerospace's analysis, the high-resolution photo of the designated area of ​​the Solara drone is only $5/km2, and the cost of the satellite that meets the same requirements is high. 35 USD / km2.

With the rapid development of new energy sources, human dependence on fossil resources is becoming less and less. The development of solar drones will promote the application of drones in various industries, but the current development of high-altitude long-haul solar drone platforms It should also be based on an innovative design of the overall concept.