Aircraft engineers of the Department of Aircraft Aerodynamics at the Moscow Aviation Institute are developing a project for a high-altitude zeppelin-type airship with solar panels, said design engineer Alexander Gomberg.
"In order to reduce the mass of the structure and abandon heavy battery cells, we propose to make solar panels (on the airship) inside a transparent shell, it will work only in the polar zone and only during the polar day," Gomberg said, speaking at the Siberian Transport Forum in Novosibirsk.
Calculations show that the batteries will allow the zeppelin to get the necessary thrust. The engineer recalled that the problem for flights at high altitude is thin air.
"We solve this issue with the help of a single pusher propeller driven by an electric motor, which has a diameter of 10 meters, in our view it is like a helicopter rotor in size," Gomberg said.
At the same time, he noted, solar panels, payload and power plant are reusable, and the shell filled with gas can be replaceable, interfax-russia.ru reports.
Alex Shishlo, Editor in Chief of the European Bureau, Rough&Polished
