Power Electronics Powertrain Architectures for

Hybrid and Solar Electric Airplanes with

Distributed Propulsion
Damien Lawhorn, Vandana Rallabandi, and Dan M. Ionel, FIEEE
SPARK Lab, Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering
University of Kentucky, Lexington, KY, USA
damien.lawhorn@uky.edu, vandana.rallabandi@uky.edu, dan.ionel@uky.edu
Abstract
Distributed propulsion in aircraft has been shown to increase reliability and benefit aerodynamic performance. This paper
discusses power electronic architectures and proposes control schemes suitable for distributed propulsion in hybrid and electric
airplanes. Hybrid electric airplanes include permanent magnet synchronous generators driven by jet engines. The output of the
generators is connected to the propulsion motors through back to back voltage source converters. Batteries, connected to the DC
bus through buck-boost converters, are used to provide additional power to the propulsion motors during take off and climb. In the
case of electric airplanes, the jet engine-permanent magnet generator system is replaced by solar photovoltaic (PV) panels. The
output of the solar PV system is controlled such that it operates at its maximum power point, and power is provided to batteries
and propulsion motors. Simulation results on both hybrid and solar electric systems are presented.
Index Terms – distributed propulsion, wide band gap semiconductor devices, solar photovolatic panels, permanent magnet
synchronous machine.
I. I NTRODUCTION
Distributed propulsion refers to airplanes with multiple thrust systems spaced along the wing and separated from the main
engines. This aircraft design concept which is projected to improve take-off and landing performance, efficiency, reliability,
noise and ride quality [1]. Distributed propulsion may be utilized in both hybrid and solar electric aircraft (Fig. 1). This paper
discusses power electronic architectures suitable for hybrid and all-electric airplanes employing distributed propulsion. In the
case of hybrid electric airplanes, the engine drives a generator whose output is rectified and feeds a DC bus. The DC bus
powers the inverters which feed the propulsion motors. A battery, connected to the DC bus, discharges during times of take-off
and landing, to supply the high power requirement of the propulsion motors, and may be charged at any time during the
flight. Superconducting electric machines have been proposed for use in aircraft with distributed electric propulsion due to
the high power density requirements [2]. Although the power electronic architectures and control strategies discussed in this
paper pertain to permanent magnet machines, they can in principle be extended for use in conjunction with superconducting
machines.
In the case of solar electric propulsion, the engine-generator is replaced by solar photovoltaic (PV) panels, and the surplus
power is stored in a battery. A solar electric car, which also includes PV panels, batteries and propulsion motors has similar
requirements. This paper also leverages and adapts a power electronics system architecture originally proposed for solar cars
[3], to solar and hybrid electric airplanes.
II. H YBRID E LECTRIC A IRCRAFT
Two electric airplanes are studied in this paper (Fig. 2 and Fig 3). The hybrid electric aircraft includes an engine which
drives a vector-controlled permanent magnet generator whose output is rectified through a controlled AC-DC converter and
feeds a DC bus. A battery is connected to the DC bus via a buck-boost converter. This powers the inverters which drive
the propulsion motors. A higher DC voltage would potentially lead to reduced conductor weight for the aircraft. The control
strategies employed for the power electronic converters are seen in Fig. 4. The generator side rectifier is fully controllable.
The advantage of such an approach is that the currents of the generator can be controlled to be sinusoidal, and at the desired
phase, leading to high efficiency and power factor. The active component of the generator current is controlled to maintain the
DC bus voltage at its set value by the operation of the rectifier as follows,
Iq∗ = (Kp + Ki /s)(Vdc ∗ −Vdc ), Id∗ = 0 (1)
where, Iq is the q component of the generator current; Kp and Ki , the controller gains; Vdc∗
and Vdc , the set and measured
DC bus voltages respectively.
The d-axis component of the current is maintained at zero, for maximum torque per ampere. The position information
required for the dq transformations is obtained from an encoder on the rotor, and sensorless control schemes can be used for

Authors’ final manuscript version. The final published version is copyrighted by IEEE and is available as: D. Lawhorn, V. Rallabandi, D. M. Ionel, “Power Electronics Powertrain
Architectures for Hybrid and Solar Electric Airplanes with Distributed Propulsion,” Electric Aircraft Technology Symposium (EATS), Cincinnati, OH, 6p., June 2018. ©2018 IEEE
Copyright Notice. “Personal use of this material is permitted. Permission from IEEE must be obtained for all other uses, in any current or future media, including reprinting/republishing
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 Table I
E LECTRIC A IRCRAFT, BASED ON [1],[4-9].

Aircraft Turbogenerator [MW] EMs [kW] Batteries [kWh] PV [kW]

NASA N3-X 30.600 (2) 4420.000 (14) N/A N/A
Airbus/Siemens/Rolls-Royce E-Fan X 2.000 (1) 2000.000 (4) 2000.000 N/A
Eviation Alice N/A 260.000 (3) 900.000 N/A
Airbus E-Fan N/A 30.000 (2) 29.000 N/A
Solar Impulse 2 (HB-SIB) None 13.000 (4) 164.000 66.000
QinetiQ Zephyr 7 N/A 0.450 (2) 3.00 N/A
Autonomous Systems Laboratory AtlantikSolar N/A 0.420 (1) 0.073 0.275

(a) (b)
Figure 1. Distributed powertrain for electric and hybrid airplanes. Inverters are placed at each motor. DC-DC converters are positioned along the wing. (a)
HEA configuration includes the main system controller, jet engine, AC-DC converter, and battery which is located central on the aircraft. (b) SEA configuration
includes solar panels distributed across the wings of the plane.

increased reliability. In case of the control of the motor side inverters, the active component of current is derived from the
following,
Iqm
∗
= (Kp + Ki /s)(ω ∗ −ω), (2)
where, Iqm is the q component of the motor current; Kp and Ki , the controller gains; ω ∗ and ω, the set and actual motor
speeds, respectively. The battery discharges during times of take-off and climb, to supply the high power requirement of the
propulsion motors, and may be charged at any time during the flight. The battery side converter is bi-directional, and operates
in the boost mode for discharging, and in the buck mode during charging. This enables the battery voltage to be smaller than
the DC bus voltage. The battery current and duty cycle are derived from a power control loop, and the sign of the commanded
power determines whether charging or discharging operation is desired. An alternative system configuration includes a multi-
port isolated DC-DC converter which interconnects the rectifier output and battery energy storage (BES) with the propulsion
motors and auxiliary loads (Fig. 5. The multi-port DC-DC (MPDCDC) includes a soft-switched DC-DC stage, operating at
very high switching frequencies. A high frequency transformer is used to provide electrical isolation between the different
ports. The high switching frequency serves to reduce the size of the transformer, and overall system filtering requirements.
This converter topology may lead to increased reliability because of the galvanic isolation between the input and output stages.
The MPDCDC is also versatile in the sense that additional ports may be added to accommodate loads at different DC bus
voltages.
III. S OLAR E LECTRIC A IRCRAFT
The power required for aircraft propulsion in the solar electric case (Fig. 3), is provided by solar PV panels on the aircraft
body. The PV panels are operated at the maximum power point by controlling the duty cycle of the boost converter that
interconnects the panels to the DC bus (Fig.6). The input of the inverters driving the propulsion motors is tapped from the
same nodes. A battery energy storage system is also connected to the DC bus via a bi-directional DC-DC converter. The duty
cycle of the battery converter is controlled to maintain the bus voltage. The battery operates in the discharging mode when
 Figure 3. Power electronics architecture schematic for the solar electric
Figure 2. Schematic of power electronics architecture for a hybrid elec-
airplane. The solar PV panel connects to the DC bus through a boost
tric airplane. The electrical output of the turbo-generator is connected to
converter, which is controlled to operate it at the maximum power point.
the DC bus through a controlled rectifier. A battery is connected to the
The battery is controlled to absorb excess power from the solar panels,
DC bus through a bi-directional boost-buck converter, and the inverters
and provide the power deficit during periods of high load and little solar
of the propulsion motor are fed through the DC bus.
availability.

Figure 4. Control schemes for the turbine governer, generator side rectifier, battery and propulsion motor. The generator side converter maintains the DC bus
voltage, and the battery charges when the flight is cruising. The battery can be controlled to discharge during take off and landing. The generator and motors
and vector controlled, and position information for the transformations is derived from an encoder, or can be estimated sensorlessly for higher reliability.

the dc bus voltage falls below the set point, and in the charging mode when the DC bus voltage exceeds the reference value,
as determined by the sign of Ib . Thus, the battery supplies the power deficit when the power from the solar panels is smaller
than that required by the propulsion motors. During periods of high solar power and little load, the surplus power from the PV
panels is stored in the battery. In case the battery’s state of charge is at the maximum limit, and power from the solar panels
exceeds the amount that can be absorbed by the propulsion motors, the duty cycle of the solar converter is modified to curtail
the input power.
An alternative system configuration includes the MPDCDC converter previously discussed in the hybrid electric airplane
section. In this configuration a multi-port isolated DC-DC converter interconnects the solar PV system and BES with the
propulsion motors and auxiliary loads (Fig. 7). The MPDCDC of this system may serve the function of maximum power point
tracking for the PV array.
Figure 5. Hybrid Electric Aircraft (HEA) system architecture with jet turbogenerator, permanent magnet synchronous generator, propulsion motor and drive,
battery, 4-port isolated high frequency DC/DC Converter, and auxiliary loads. In this implementation, the propulsion motors are fed from individual inverters
connected to the same DC bus.

Figure 6. Control of the power electronic converters for the solar electric airplane. The solar side converter operates the PV system at the maximum power
point. The battery converter regulates the DC bus voltage, and the traction inverters provide the required power to the motors.

IV. S IMULATION R ESULTS

Simulation of the system in Fig. 2 included driving the propulsion motors and generator over a given flight profile (Fig. 8a).
The rating of the generator is 1MW, and the system includes 4-propulsion motors, each rated for 250kW. The DC bus voltage
is considered to be 1.1 kV. The results for system power flow including power output from the motor, generator, and batteries
are shown in Fig. 8. The flight profile shown represents the aircraft climbing to a stable low altitude, at which it cruises for 10
minutes. Upon leaving this stage, the aircraft ascends to a high altitude cruise, which it remains at for an additional 20 minutes.
Next, the airplane begins the descent stage. Finally, another brief low altitude cruise is done before landing. The generator
operates throughout the entire flight cycle. During the climb stages of the mission, the power demand from the propulsion
motors is at its peak value. When a cruise altitude is reached, propulsion motor power demand is lowered. In such a situation,
the battery is controlled to charge and non-operating propulsion motor propellers could be retracted to increase aerodynamic
efficiency (Fig. 8(b)). During the descent stages, the required motor power is minimal. The battery is only required during
periods of climb, and as the generator may provide power in other instances, its operation may be disabled after charging to
Figure 7. Solar Electric Aircraft (SEA) system architecture. System includes: permanent magnet synchronous machines (PMSM), motor drives, battery,
4pDC/DC Converter, PV array, and auxiliary loads. 4pDC/DC converter controls the power flow between the various components connected to the bus.

(a) (b) (c)

Figure 8. Simulations results of the HEA system. (a) Example flight profile of the mission, (b) Power flow of the generator, motor and battery under different
operating conditions, with positive and negative signs corresponding to power absorption and delivery, respectively. (c) The d-axis current of the generator is
always maintained at zero, while the q-axis current increases to supply the load of the propulsion motor, and battery.

(a) (b)
Figure 9. Simulation results for the power flow of a solar electric airplane. (a) Example flight profile of the mission including a climb stage, regenerative
soaring through thermal updraft, cruising, and landing. (b) Power flow between the components of the system. A 50% dip in irradiance occurs at t=50-60s.
full capacity to protect the system from overcharge damage. At t = 20min, the power demand from the propulsion motors
increases, such an event may occur during take off and climb, and the battery discharges. At all operating instants, the DC bus
voltage is maintained constant by the operation of the generator rectifier. Additionally, the generator currents are controllable
as sinusoidal waveforms as can be inferred from Fig. 8 (c), which is achieved by the use of the controlled rectifier.
Simulation studies are also performed for the system of Fig. 7 for different conditions of solar irradiance and environmental
situations. The flight profile and power flow is recorded (Fig. 9). The plane climbs to a low cruising altitude in search of
thermal updrafts (Fig. 9a). During the climb the propulsion motor operates at its peak power. When reaching the cruising
altitude, the required power drops to well below peak power. At t=20min the aircraft reaches a thermal updraft and the power
to the propulsion motors is haulted. In this stage the aircraft gains altitude due to the thermal updraft. At t=30min the aircraft
exits the updraft region and begins to descend to cruising altitude again. During this time period from t=20-30min the electric
motors act as generators, sending power back to the battery. From t=50min-60min a solar irradiation dip of 50% occurs, at
which point the battery output must supply the power demand difference. Beginning at t=70min, the aircraft glides to a landing
using no power for the propulsion motors. The power flow of the flight cycle is shown in Fig. 9b. When the input solar
energy is sufficient, it drives the propulsion motor as well as charges the battery and supplies auxiliary load. During periods of
shading, the battery discharges to supply the required power to the motor as well as the auxiliary load. The BES also absorbs
energy from the propulsion motor during regenerative soaring as suggested in [10]. The power flow in the MPDCDC converter
is controlled by the phase shift between gating signals to the intermediate DC-AC stages. The phase shifts are controlled to
operate the solar panels at the maximum power point, as well as achieve a power balance.
V. C ONCLUSIONS
The paper discusses power electronics and control architectures for hybrid and solar electric vehicles. In the hybrid electric
vehicle, the engine is driven by a synchronous generator whose output is connected to the DC bus through a controlled rectifier.
A battery is also connected to the DC bus through a bi-directional DC-DC converter. The rectifier is controlled to maintain
the DC bus voltage. The propulsion motors are driven from this bus, and the battery discharges when the power demand is
high, such as during take off and climb periods. In case of the solar electric airplane, the DC bus is fed from solar panels,
through a boost converter. Batteries are controlled to regulate the DC bus voltage. In addition, a multi-port DC-DC converter
which provides galvanic isolation can be used for increased reliability. Simulation results are presented for two different flight
profiles, including regenerative soaring in the case of the solar electric plane. Future work includes battery sizing, for both
HEA and SEA systems. Additional work could be done on including fly-by-wire flight control systems as loads into the power
system modeling.
ACKNOWLEDGMENT
The support of this research by the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, through the NASA Grant no. KY
GF-18-020, University of Kentucky, the L. Stanley Pigman endowment, and ANSYS, Inc. is gratefully acknowledged.
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