Dynamic Response Analysis of Composite Tether Structure to Airborne Wind Energy System under Impulsive Load

• Main Author: Kwangtae Ha
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: MDPI AG 2021-12-01
• Series: Applied Sciences
• Subjects: tether; failure analysis; airborne wind energy system (AWES); composite
• Online Access: https://www.mdpi.com/2076-3417/11/1/166

The tether structure plays the role of transferring the traction force of an airborne wind energy system (AWES) to the fixed or mobile ground system with less motion and maintains the flying airborne system as a critical component. The implementation of a geometrically tailored tether design in an AWES could avoid unwanted snap-through failure, which can be take place in a conventional tether structure under impulsive loading. This concept relies on the redundant load path of the composite structure composed of tailored length and strength. In this study, the dynamic response of this composite tether structure to airborne wind energy systems, such as a kite wind power system, was analytically investigated. Also, for very long tether applications, an approximate model of the tether response was developed, which resulted in a dramatic reduction of computational efforts while preserving the accuracy quite well compared to the exact solution.