Unmanned Aerial Vehicles
GET Enables In-air Charging of Battery-powered Drones
GET's "power cloud" system enables charging of electric drones
GET's Sergey Plekhanov (left) and William Kallman with a drone modified to charge from the company's "power cloud." (photo: Mark Huber)
GET's Sergey Plekhanov (left) and William Kallman with a drone modified to charge from the company's "power cloud." (photo: Mark Huber)

Imagine an electric-powered drone that never needs to land. That’s the future envisioned by Global Energy Transmission (GET) and on display this week at the Association for Unmanned Vehicle Systems International (AUVSI) convention in Chicago. 

GET is based on patented technology developed by Russian brothers Leonid and Sergey Plekhanov, graduates of the Moscow Institute of Physics and Technology (MIPT). Using this technology, a battery-operated drone can recharge while flying over a 40-foot diameter spherical “cloud” of Litz wire in six minutes and then go on to fly for 40 more minutes and then repeat the process endlessly, limited only by the occasional maintenance required on the drone’s motors. Litz wire carries alternating current at radio frequencies and is designed to reduce surface and proximity effect losses.

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