Survey of Technology Developments in Flywheel Attitude Control and Energy Storage Systems

摘要

Advances in microprocessors and composite materials in the past decade, along with limitations of chemicalrnbatteries for U.S. Air Force mission concepts, have caused a renewed interest in flywheel energy storage systems forrnspace applications. This interest has also been driven in the past by the promise of using flywheel systems for energyrnstorage and as attitude control actuators. The primary issues are power efficiency, mass and size, and long-termrnstability. Flywheels as one-to-one replacements for spacecraft batteries are competitive for only a few specialrnmissions.When flywheels replace components in two major bus subsystems, the potential mass and volume benefitsrnare attractive. This especially benefits future small satellite missions that seek agile slewing with high peak power.rnThe objective of this paper is to describe the progression of the flywheel technology state of the art for combinedrnenergy storage and attitude control systems in space applications and the current energy storage and attitude controlrnsystems efforts.