Evaluation of the Energy Budget of a Solar Powered Autonomous Surface Vehicle

With the increasing need for real-time monitoring and management of aquatic ecosystems, autonomous surface vehicles (ASV) are a vital tool for in situ water quality sampling. Compared to conventional monitoring methods, solar powered ASVs (SP-ASV) serve as mobile monitoring stations equipped with various sensor platforms to enhance spatio-temporal water quality data collection by providing extended-duration, continuous monitoring of diverse ecosystem. The SeaTrac SP-48 is ASV designed to surface navigate varying aquatic ecosystems. The SP-48’s solar power system, navigational dashboard, payload capacity, and sensor agnostic design provide capabilities to host and power a variety of sensors for multi-task over-the-horizon operations to persistently and autonomously monitor aquatic ecosystems for extended durations of time.The objective of this research was to evaluate the energy budget (energy production/consumption) of a commercially available multi-purpose SP-ASV (SeaTrac SP-48) equipped with an integrated payload package of environmental monitoring sensors during an extended-duration mission. For this study, operation of the integrated sensors package and SP-48 navigation system resulted in a mean power load of 0.14 kW. Due to decreasing solar energy potential over the 29-day period (photoperiod (PD), sun angle, and weather conditions), energy consumption was slightly higher than energy production.The results of this work will benefit ASV operators when planning missions in order to manage an energy budget. The results will also help researchers and ASV operators optimize energy consumption. Future work should assess ASV energy budget in summer months as photoperiod and solar irradiance are at peak levels to establish peak performance baselines