NASA Working On High-Flying Wind Technology

The wind-energy sector is rapidly growing, and it was pretty much time that NASA included itself in it. As per NASA, the new airborne structures face two very major problems - for one, they don't have proper aerodynamics governing them; and secondly, the companies which've designed autonomous systems capable of covering a larger range and greater heights are equipped with very expensive on-board electronic components and flight-control systems. NASA aims to cut down these very cost and develop a simpler and cheaper system having better aeronautics.

#-Link-Snipped-#

This March, NASA even came up with an autonomous kite that was observed using a cheap webcam mounted on a laptop in the gound that coursed the kite's movement, with a software pretty similar to the Microsoft Kinect system. The prototype that NASA came up with had only a 10 feet wingspan, but can be modified to have a wingspan as large as those of Boeing 747s. The prototype so far has been tested only at lower heights, and further operations are still going on.

Via: #-Link-Snipped-#