Hybrid Solar & Wind Energy Harvesting on Mars

Punnag
Research Abstract:
This research proposes to develop multifunctional compliant structuture that can generate electrical power from both incident solar radiation and ambient wind flow. Such a device would an ideal power source for small rovers, data collection stations and one day even human settlements on Mars. While PV are generally a viable source of power on Mars, sunlight becomes intermittently unavailable due to massive dust storms that may block the sun and shutdown solar harvesters for months at a stretch. These duststorms are created by strong winds that provide a secondary opportunity for power generation through harvesting the wind kinetic energy. Thus creating a single device that has the capacity to generate power from both these disparate energy sources could provide reliable, year round power source on Mars. Even though similar concepts have been proposed by NASA for this reason (1) current available technologies have made this option unattractive due to complexity and mass budget issues. Such a device could be robust enough to find varied applications on Earth too.

References:

  1. Bluck, J. “Antartic/Alaska-like Wind Turbines could be used on Mars”, NASA Ames News Release, 01-72AR (2001)– Available Online

Researchers:

  1. Punnag Chatterjee
  2. Snehal Patel

Publications:

  1. Chatterjee, P., Bryant, M., “Transfer Matrix Modeling of a Tensioned Piezo-Solar Hybrid Energy Harvesting Ribbon,” Proc. SPIE Conference on Smart Structures and Materials: Active and Passive Smart Structures and Integrated Systems, March 8-12, San Diego, CA, 2015
  2. Chatterjee, P. M. and Bryant, M., “Aeroelastic-photovoltaic ribbons for integrated wind and solar energy harvesting ,” Smart Mater. Struct, Vol. 27, No. 8, 2018.

Project Funding:
PunnagPunnagPunnag