Research & Development Lines
The AW3 Group carries out R&D in a broad range of airborne wind energy fields, combining knowledge from aerospace and electrical engineering
Experimental Validation of AWE Systems
The AW3 group has developed a yo-yo AWE demonstrator. In this ground generation system, electrical power is produced periodically. During the power generation phase, the cross-wind trajectory followed by the aircraft induces high tension to drive the tether’s reel-out and generate electricity on the ground station. Afterwards, the tether is reeled-in consuming a small fraction of power.
The UC3M demonstrator serves as a versatile research platform designed to explore a broad range of AWE architectures, including ground-actuated, fly-actuated and multi-line configurations involving one, two, or three tethers.
Modelling & Simulation
AW3 group has developed a suit of numerical tools to simulate AWE systems hollistically. It includes:
- Flow simulation tools to study the stationary and non-stationary aerodynamics
- LAKSA, an open source suite of modules dedicated to study the dynamics and control of AWE systems (ground-gen, fly-gen, ground-actuated, fly-actuated, single and multi-aircraft configurations and rotary AWE machines)
- M2ES, simulation tool that enables the study of the mechanical-to-electrical power conversion chain.
- Development of state estimators applied to flight dynamics and control and aerodynamic characterization using estimation before modelling techniques.
Beyond basic research, these tools drive our experimental activities, from hardware in the loop testing in our lab, to full-scale field validation with our AWE demonstrator.
Power Conversion, Management & Integration
The mechanical to electrical power conversion of ground-gen AWE systems and the management and integration of the energy into the grid are active fields of research in our group. They include:
- Development of HIL systems to study the mechanical-to-electrical power conversion of AWE systems
- Instrumentation, data acquisition, embedded control, monitoring, and estimation of electrical variables in AWE systems
- Power electronics design and control of grid-connected, as well as isolated, AWE systems
- Design of power-efficient control solutions for electric machines and power converters
Mechatronics, Avionics & Instrumentation
Thanks to the development of the AWE demonstrator, the AW3 group has deep background and is active in the following fields:
- Mechatronics of ground-actuated systems to control multi-line tethered aircraft
- Development of control pods for fly-actuated AWE systems
- Onboard avionics and software
- Onboard instruments to collect scientific data during flight testing
