While Boeing and AeroVironment proceed with stratospheric, hydrogen-powered giants such as the Phantom Eye and the Global Observer for extremely long-range surveillance and monitoring duties, an Albuquerque, New Mexico company is exploring the potential of a small, lower-altitude, hand-launched craft that can search – and if necessary – destroy. A recent report from Volta Volare’s Paul Peterson attending the Association for Unmanned Vehicle Systems International conclave in Las Vegas, Nevada and an email from George Bye, Chairman and CEO of Bye Aerospace, alerted your editor to the new reconnaissance aircraft. George wrote, “While the electric Cessna program continues to advance under the leadership of Charlie Johnson and a new name, ‘Beyond Aviation’, we have continued our research into solar-electric hybrid propulsion in unmanned aircraft. At the early August 2012 AUVSI conference, my company, Bye Aerospace together with Silent Falcon UAS Technologies, unveiled a small solar-electric powered drone. The remarkable economics and technology is proven and the performance benefits have been demonstrated.” …
Algae Biofuels Producers, NASA Combine Forces
OriginOil and Algasol are two algae–to-oil producers who’ve joined forces to cultivate and harvest micro algae that can perhaps “reach a tipping point and compete with petroleum.” Algasol’s process perhaps most closely resembles that shown by NASA scientist Dr. Johnathan Trent, which he presented at the fourth annual Electric Aircraft Symposium. His OMEGA, “Offshore Membrane Enclosure for Growing Algae” relies on water motion and sunlight to churn treated wastewater that otherwise would be literally dumped into the ocean into a refineable algae. Waste CO2 can also be used to generate algae, another “two-fer” that would clean up the environment while providing a literally green fuel source. In their joint press release, the two firms explain, “Algasol’s floating bags or photobioreactors (PBRs) can operate in the ocean or in salt water ponds on land. Because they float, Algasol believes their PBRs achieve optimal light exposure with outstanding productivity results and avoid the high temperature and excess salinity often encountered in solar …
PC-Aero’s Elektra One
Dipl. Ing. Calin Gologan, an exhibitor and presenter at this year’s E-Flight Expo at Friedrichshafen, will be at the fourth annual Electric Aircraft Symposium, discussing the design and technology he hopes will imbue the winning entry in next year’s Green Flight Challenge. He notes that the GFC, “the world’s largest prize…awarded in general aviation,” was a major incentive in his pressing forward with an environmentally conscientious design. His Elektra One is part his PC-Aero’s ambitious campaign to fly three different electric aircraft in the next few years, the single-seat “One,” two-seat “Two,”, and most ambitiously, a four-seat “Four.” With at least the shell of Elektra One at the Expo, Gologan is making good progress toward completion of his GFC machine, the prototype for the first of a line of production aircraft. Gologan’s goals are enunciated in his PC-Aero web site. “The Elektra One is environmentally friendly, because it flies without CO2 emissions. It is light and has a high end aerodynamics. Integrated are …