Wing Sail Electric Hybrid Propulsion for Autonomous Long Endurance Unmanned Surface Craft

KaZaK Composites, Inc. (KaZaK) proposes to team with the Charles Stark Draper Laboratory's Autonomous Vehicle Lab to develop a long endurance unmanned surface vehicle. The envisioned design will investigate a high performance rigid wing-sail as the primary source of motive power, and also harvest electric energy from the wind-induced motion through the water. Energy storage, to handle the intermittent nature of all potential environmental energy sources, will be provided by a battery bank. Batteries will also provide power for mission specific packages and communications. Supplemental options such as solar cells to provide additional energy harvesting will also be evaluated. A key feature of the proposed design is the use of commercially available hardware developed from the recreational boating market in order to reduce costs, reduce risk and shorten time to fleet service. COTS systems will include the electric propulsion unit and related energy conversion / storage. This approach will allow the KaZaK team to focus on the two primary technical challenges, the wing sail design and the control / management function. To maximize resistance to system damage in heavy weather, the KaZaK team will evaluate the application of highly damage resistant macro-composite structures technology for the rigid sail system.