Airborne Wind Energy for Martian Habitats

Renewable energy for Mars habitats is of key interest for future crewed missions. However, the low solar irradiation and low atmospheric pressure on Mars pose serious challenges to exploiting these resources reliably. In this chapter, we investigate the technical feasibility of a soft-kite-based airborne wind energy system and its potential to...

Scaling Airborne Wind Energy Systems for Deployment on Mars

Although technologically challenging, airborne wind energy systems have several advantages over conventional wind turbines that make them an interesting option for deployment on Mars. However, the environmental conditions on the red planet are quite different from those on Earth. The atmosphere’s density is about 100 times lower, and gravity is...

Advancing Design-To-Robotic-Production and -Assembly of Underground Habitats on Mars

In order for off-Earth top surface structures built from regolith to protect astronauts from radiation, they need to be several metres thick. In a feasibility study, funded by the European Space Agency, Technical University Delft (TUD aka TU Delft) explored the possibility of building in empty lava tubes to create rhizomatic subsurface habitats....

Flight path planning in a turbulent wind environment

To achieve a high conversion efficiency and at the same time robust control of a pumping kite power system it is crucial to optimize the three-dimensional flight path of the tethered wing. This chapter extends a dynamic system model to account for a realistic, turbulent wind environment and adds a flight path planner using a sequence of...

Airborne wind energy conversion using a rotating reel system

The study proposes a new airborne wind energy system based on the carousel concept. It comprises a rotary ring kite and a ground-based rotating reel conversion system. The moment generated by the ring kite is transferred by several peripheral tethers that connect to winch modules that are mounted on the ground rotor. A generator is coupled to...

Design and Economics of a Pumping KiteWind Park

The development of airborne wind energy is steadily progressing towards the market introduction of the technology. Even though the physical foundations of the various conversion concepts are well understood, the actual economic potential of distributed small-scale and centralized large-scale power generation under realworld conditions is...

Current and expected airspace regulations for airborne wind energy systems

Safety is a major factor in the permitting process for airborne wind energy systems. To successfully commercialize the technologies, safety and reliability have to be ensured by the design methodology and have to meet accepted standards. Current prototypes operate with special temporary permits, usually issued by local aviation authorities...