Power Manager for Special Operations Portable Power Applications

The Air Force is looking for an integrated power management system that can harvest/manage energy from several different energy sources, provide power to the myriad of devices that the soldier must carry, each with varying voltage and current requirements, and provide information back to the soldier with regard to the usage rate, estimate time of operation at current level, warnings and course of action alarms. Schafer proposes an integrated power management system (IPMS) utilizing state-of-the-art micro-power electronic technologies and innovative control strategies. All of the power electronic subsystems are internally connected to a common bus and the entire IPMS is contained in a field-portable belt-mounted package. This design process will provide insight into technical trade-off-issues between performance and weight. Additionally, power management communications alternatives are addressed with candidate technologies identified and preliminary designs developed.