Renewable Energy Cheaper than Oil

Mario Milanese, Kitenergy srl

 Kitenergy technology

Kitenergy srl was established in November 2010 to respond to a

main challenge that mankind will be facing in the near future.

Production of energy from renewable source at

lower costs than from fossil sources in order to face:
– the increasing world energy demand
– the increasing costs of fossil sources
– the geopolitical risks in fossil sources supply
– the increasing pressure on the energy industry in relation to
climate change issues
 Limits of present renewable technologies

High production costs incentives are required for installations

Large occupation of land

Without significant breakthroughs, even reaching the objectives posed

by many countries (e.g. 20% for 2020 in EU) is a difficult challenge
 Challenges Targets

Energy production costs

lower than from fossil
< 50 €/MWh
sources

Power density comparable
> 20 MW/Km2

to thermal/nuclear plants

Source available
CF > 0.5

anywhere

…………………….
………………
 Kitenergy project

A radical innovation in wind technology, aimed at generating

renewable energy at cost lower than from fossil sources

Exploiting the altitude wind: a renewable energy source largely
available anywhere

Earth’s atmosphere transforms part of the Sun heating into

mechanical energy of wind.

Sun heating 150.000 TW

Wind 3.500 TW
Mankind primary power needs 14 TW
 Altitude vs. ground wind

Wind power is already extremely promising at 200-800 meters over

the ground, where the average wind speed is estimated at 7.2 m/s

The related wind power is almost 4 times the one globally
available at 50-150 meters over the ground for wind towers

Altitude Wind Speed Wind Power

800 m 7.2 m/s 205 W/m2

80 m 4.6 m/s 58 W/m2
 The problem

Wind at 200-800 m is out of the reach of current and future

aerogenerating towers, already struggling at 150 m

The structure holding up the rotors becomes exponentially heavier,
more unstable and expensive

The actual 3-MW wind turbines
have towers 100-m high,
with 90-m-diameter rotors and
a weight of 370 t.

The average power/km2 of a
wind farm in a ‘good’ site
(CF=0.35) is 3.5 MW/km2 Sketch of a wind tower and of a wind farm
 The Kitenergy solution

A radical shift of perspective: no longer heavy and static structures,

but light, dynamic and intelligent machines

Altitude wind power is channelled

to ground through automatically
controlled tethered airfoils (kites)
 Kitenergy key technology

The core is the system of automatic control of the kite flight, called
KSU (Kite Steering Unit)

kite
on board sensors ground sensors
(kite position and speed) (wind speed and
direction,
line strength ,…)

cables
control
software

actuation unit
(electric drives, winches,..)
 Kitenergy key technology

In wind towers, the outermost 20% of the blades contributes for 80% of
the power
Wind turbine Kitenergy

Torre eolica

The kite acts as the outermost part of the blades without requiring the
heavy tower
 High tech cables

Connecting each power kites to the units at ground level for power
generation, 2 composite cables transmit the traction force and are
differentially adjusted for manouvering

Traction force: 10 t / cm2

Weight: 100 kg /km*cm2

Traction force/Weight:
15 times higher than steel
Energy generation: yoyo configuration

1. Wind moves the power kites

pulling the cables out of the
winches. Rotation is
transmitted to the generator for
the production of electricity

2. Cables are pulled back by the

winches, this time moved by
the engines, with a minimal
power consumption

POSITIVE BALANCE (~92%):

Energy produced during phase
1 is more than the energy
spent during phase 2
 Flight paths

The kite is driven to fly fast in

crosswind direction, with “figure
Generation phase
eight” trajectories

Model Predictive Control
techniques are applied to:
– keep stability of the airfoil
Recovery phase
– maximize the net generated
energy
Z – satisfy physical constraints
(keep the kite far from the
ground, avoid line entangling,
Y
maximal cable strength, ….)
X – attenuate the effects of wind
KSU
Wind turbolence
direction
 Capacity Factor

Due to wind variability, a wind generator is able to produce in

average only a fraction of its rated power, called “Capacity Factor”

Pav = Pmax ⋅ CF

The Capacity Factor depends on:
power curve of the generator probability of wind speed

KITEnrg
 Capacity Factor examples

De Bilt (NL) Linate (IT)

200-800 m 200-800 m
50-150 m 50-150 m

Linate (IT) B. Aires (AR) Cagliari (IT) Leba (PO) Brindisi (IT) De Bilt (NL)
0.006 0.18 0.31 0.32 0.31 0.36
0.33 0.63 0.56 0.68 0.60 0.71
Capacity factors of wind tower (black) and of KITEnrg-yoyo (orange) in some locations
Wind data taken from the NOAA/ESRL Radiosonde Database
 KITEnrg Farm

In a farm layout several KITEnrg-yoyos are displaced in order to

avoid kite collision and aerodynamic interferences
 Power density of KITEnrg Farms

In a “windy” site:

Kitenergy Technology
– 16 KITEnrg-yoyo/km2
– 32 MW/km2 (rated)
– 22 MW/km2 (average)

Actual wind technology

– 4.5 towers/km2
– 9 MW/km2 (rated)
– 3.4 MW/km2 (average)
 Energy production costs

The Kitenergy technology has the potential of generating renewable

energy at lower cost than energy generated from fossil sources

Source Min. Estimated Max. Estimated Av. Estimated cost

cost (€/MWh) cost (€/MWh) (€/MWh)
Coal 23 46 31
Gas 34 56 44
Nuclear 19 29 27
Wind 32 88 53
Solar 167 463 301
Kitenergy 14 46 24

Projected cost in 2030 (levelised in 2003 Euros per MWh) of energy from different sources compared
with the estimated cost of Kitenergy
Source: International Energy Agency (IEA), Projected Cost of Generating Energy – 2005 update.
Paris, France: IEA PUBLICATIONS, 2008
 Kitenergy development status

The project started in 2005 at the Complex Systems Modeling &

Control group of Politecnico di Torino in collaboration with small hi-
tech companies

It has been supported by Regione Piemonte, Ministero della Ricerca
and European Union

Advanced modeling and computer simulations have been performed
to assess the energy generation potentials

A 40 kW peak power prototype has been built and first tested in
September 2006, able to generate energy with 1 km cable length

The tests until now performed allowed to experimentally verify the
simulation results

Kitenergy srl was established in 2010 with the aim of developing
further the technology towards the industrialisation phase
 The prototype – KSU1

The prototype has been constructed to produce energy in KE-yoyo

configuration:
– max power: 40 kW
– lines length: 1000 m
– kite area: up to 20 m2

 During 2007-2009 the

prototype was successfully
tested to experimentally
verify the simulation results
 Experimental vs. simulation

Test 1
– turbulent wind of about 3-4 m/s at ground
level
– kite effective area: 5 m2,
– maximum line length: 300 m

Test 2
– wind of about 1-2 m/s at ground level
– Kite effective area: 10 m2
– maximum line length: 800 m

Simulated Simulated
Measured Measured
KSU prototype signal pattern
 KSU prototype data acquisition

Acquire experimental data in order to validate the mathematical

models

Kite heading and position with respect to the ground station

Meteorological data to improve the wind models

Generated and consumed power during the yo-yo cycles
 KSU software tools

Control and data acquisition systems has been implemented

with Real-Time Labview, exploiting the multiprocessor function
of NI-PXI

A first processor manages data acquisition, prefiltering, control
actuation

A second processor implements the Fast Model Predictive
Control for kite flight control at a sampling time of 100 ms

The low-level motor drive control is performed by a FPGA board
at a sampling time of 10 ms
 Future development plan

The future development plan of Kitenergy is composed of 3 main phases.

1. The first phase is on-going and is focused on completing the
experimental tests on an improved prototype implementing the full
automatic control. The output expected by October 2011 will be energy
generation for periods exceeding the 24 hours with minimal human
assistance
2. The second phase will last 20 months and will be focused on the
design, development and construction of an industrial prototype with
200 kW nominal power. The output will be the industrial prototype
successful tests and operation.
3. The third phase will be focused on the industrialization of the KITEnrg
yo-yo plants. The third phase will require the establishment of robust
industrial partnerships.
 Contacts

mario.milanese@kitenergy.net

www.kitenergy.net