U.S. Military Wants Solar Powered UAV that Can Orbit an Area for Five Years
August 24th, 2008Via: BBC:
A UK-built solar-powered plane has set an unofficial world endurance record for a flight by an unmanned aircraft.
The Zephyr-6, as it is known, stayed aloft for more than three days, running through the night on batteries it had recharged in sunlight.
The flight was a demonstration for the US military, which is looking for new types of technology to support its troops on the ground.
Craft like Zephyr might make ideal platforms for reconnaissance.
They could also be used to relay battlefield communications.
Chris Kelleher, from UK defence and research firm QinetiQ, said Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) offer advantages over traditional aircraft and even satellites.
“The principal advantage is persistence – that you would be there all the time,” he told BBC News. “A satellite goes over the same part of the Earth twice a day – and one of those is at night – so it’s only really getting a snapshot of activity. Zephyr would be watching all day.”
…
Zephyr has demonstrated that it can cope with extremes of temperature – from the blistering 45C heat found at ground level in Arizona’s Sonoran Desert, to the minus 70C chill experienced at altitudes of more than 18km (60,000ft).
The engineers from the Farnborough-based company are now collaborating with the American aerospace giant Boeing on a defence project codenamed Vulture.
This would see the biggest plane in history take to the sky, powered by the sun and capable of carrying a 450-kilo (1,000lb) payload.
US commanders say the design must be able to maintain its position over a particular spot on the Earth’s surface uninterrupted for five years.
Research Credit: ltcolonelnemo
This would be more of that “energy independence for the modern war-fighter” stuff, I guess. It stands to reason that the military-industrial complex isn’t going to let itself be taken down by a mere trifle such as fossil-fuel depletion.
Now will the public ever be allowed to access this technology? The same products have been on the market for years with zero improvement. I’m growing tired of the suppresion of new technology for the public, give me a new solar panel please, I’ll buy 20. It would be nice if it wasn’t made by an oil company as well.
Here’s dreaming!
Why would you need anything like this in continuous operation for five years!?
Perhaps if you depopulated rural areas and funnelled everyone into worker-drone cities and wanted to make sure no stragglers were left behind living off the land.