Ampyx Power - Airborne Wind Energy

About : Ampyx Power is developing an Airborne Wind Energy (AWE) system using a tethered aircraft that flies like a kite. Fifty highly skilled professionals with more than 20 nationalities are working from The Hague, Netherlands and Melbourne, Australia on a Dutch innovation that uses the more constant and powerful winds above 200 m. The system fits in containers and requires much less material to construct, smaller foundation, and infrastructure than conventional technologies. With AWE innovation, new locations for wind energy can be unlocked (incl. floating offshore, rural onshore). Energy is harvested efficiently, reducing materials, foundations and carbon footprint, while lower visual and noise impact can ease public acceptance.

Vision : Our vision is to create innovative, elegant technology to harvest untapped energy sources for a sustainable future and our mission is to expand the sustainable energy supply with airborne wind innovation.

The Technology : The objective of the Airborne Wind Energy System is to capture the vast wind resource at higher altitudes with much less material than used in conventional wind turbines. The automatic aircraft is tethered to a generator on the ground. It moves in a regular cross wind pattern at an altitude from 200 m up to 450 m. When the aircraft moves, it pulls the tether which drives the generator. Once the tether is reeled out to a predefined tether length of about 750 m, the aircraft automatically returns towards a lower altitude causing the tether to reel in. Then it ascends and repeats the process. The aircraft lands and takes off automatically from a platform, by utilizing an array of sensors which provide the autopilot with critical information to perform the task safely.