Feasibility Analysis of Hybrid Power System Used on Solar-Powered Aircraft

Abstract:

Using only photovoltaic battery on solar-powered aircraft will waste energy because of its low conversion efficiency. For reusing the energy that converted into heat by photovoltaic cells, a hybrid power system is presented in this paper for solar-powered aircraft. Its a new electricity-generating method that spreading photovoltaic cells on the wing surface and arranging photothermal cells in the wing box section. Due to temperature of the back of photovoltaic battery is high, it can be used as high temperature heat source. And the lower wing surface can be a low temperature cooling source. A lightweight solar-powered UAV was used to analyze the relevant performances of pure photovoltaic powered aircraft and hybrid powered aircraft. The result shows that using hybrid system can reduce the area of wing by 4.6%, and solar-powered aircraft with a 6m or below-6m wingspan can raise the utilization rate of solar energy per unit area by adopting hybrid power system.

• Periodical: Advanced Materials Research (Volumes 860-863)
• Pages: 118-123
• DOI: https://doi.org/10.4028/www.scientific.net/AMR.860-863.118
• Online since: December 2013
• Authors: Kang Wen Sun, Min Ni
• Keywords: Hybrid Power System, Photovoltaic (PV), Solar-Powered Aircraft, Wingspan

References

[1] Mring L, DeBlasio R, O'sullivan G A Tomko: An advance PV system simulator to dememonstrate the performance of advance PV cell and devices. In proceeding of 16th IEEE PV.

[2] Zhengming Zhao, Solar: Photovoltaic Power Generation and Its Application. Beijing, Science Press, (2005).

[3] Kame Khouzam, Chen Khoon Koh, Poo Yong Ng: Simulation and Real-timeModelling of Space photovoltaic systems[J]. IEEE. 1994, 2038-(2041).

DOI: 10.1109/wcpec.1994.520770

[4] D. L. king, M. A. Quintana,J. A. Kratochvi, D. E. Ellibee, B. R. Hansen: PV Module Performanceand Durability Following Long Term Field Exosure. Sandia National Laboratories Albuquerque, NM 87185-0752.

[5] Esram T, Chapman PL: Comparison of Photovoltaic Array Maximum Power Point Tracking Methods. IEEE Transactions on Energy Conversion, June 2007, 22(2).

DOI: 10.1109/tec.2006.874230

[6] Nobuyoshi Mutoh, Masahiro Ohno, Takayoshi Inoue: A Method for MPPT Control While Searching for Parameters Corresponding to Weather Conditions for PV Generation System. IEEE Trans IndElectron, 2006, 53(4): 105521065.

DOI: 10.1109/tie.2006.878328

[7] Anatychuk L I. Physics of Thermoelectricity. Kyiv: Institute of Thermoelectricity, (1998).

[8] Vorobie Y, Gonza'lez-Hernandez J, Vorobiev P, et: Thermal-photovoltaic solar hybrid system for efficient solar energy conversion. Solar Energy, 206(80): 170-176.

DOI: 10.1016/j.solener.2005.04.022