N242-099 TITLE: Wireless Power Transfer

OUSD (R&E) CRITICAL TECHNOLOGY AREA(S): Directed Energy (DE); Renewable Energy Generation and Storage; Sustainment

The technology within this topic is restricted under the International Traffic in Arms Regulation (ITAR), 22 CFR Parts 120-130, which controls the export and import of defense-related material and services, including export of sensitive technical data, or the Export Administration Regulation (EAR), 15 CFR Parts 730-774, which controls dual use items. Offerors must disclose any proposed use of foreign nationals (FNs), their country(ies) of origin, the type of visa or work permit possessed, and the statement of work (SOW) tasks intended for accomplishment by the FN(s) in accordance with the Announcement. Offerors are advised foreign nationals proposed to perform on this topic may be restricted due to the technical data under US Export Control Laws.

OBJECTIVE: Develop Navy shipboard relevant wireless power transfer (WPT) methods for enabling new technologies such as Unmanned Vehicles (UxVs), providing new recoverability methods, providing shore power supply, and increasing energy resilience.

DESCRIPTION: Current industry standards, such as SAE J2954, address uni-directional WPT to stationary receivers on the order of tens of kilowatt (kW). SAE J2954/2 provides guidance on extending this standard to 500kW at approximately 10 inches.

United States Navy (USN) applications require distances greater than 10 inches for shore power supply and recharge of UxVs while at sea applications. The increased distance avoids risk of damage to ships or UxVs. In several applications the Navy requires power levels extending beyond 500kW. Increasing the power above the currently available solutions allows the technology to be applicable to larger platforms and higher recharge rates of UxVs. Additionally, placement of the WPT sending/receiving units is a challenge in a shipboard environment. The Navy requires WPT to pass through inclement weather, water layers, and ideally through various metals such as steel and aluminum. This SBIR topic aims at providing the USN benefit of WPT for application to damage recovery (casualty power connection), remote vehicle charging, shore power connection, and off-board power sharing. Metrics for WPT include distance, power magnitude, transmitting and receiver size, position alignment flexibility (static and dynamic), impact of different media in the WPT gap, safety, efficiency, and bi-directionality. These metrics will be compared against commercially available wireless power transfer solutions.

PHASE I: Identify challenges to utilization of WPT to USN applications. Model and simulate wireless power transfer capabilities across air, steel, aluminum, and salt water gaps. Analysis will demonstration how the WPT solution provides improvements over the J2954 standards and other WPT solutions in terms of the metrics provided in the Description.

PHASE II: Develop prototype WPT hardware solutions. Prototypes shall be capable of interfacing with at least one side of the WPT system operating at or electrically connected to a MIL-STD-1399-300-1 or -2 defined interface. Validate and verify the model outputs using prototype hardware in the loop (HIL) testing at a USN accredited test site at a relevant power level/scale.

PHASE III DUAL USE APPLICATIONS: Support transition to Navy use. Any development in this space can build upon currently available industry standards and therefore help enable a system supporting higher power wireless power transfer systems required for ubiquitous unmanned, electric vehicle societies.

REFERENCES:

1. "SAE J2594/2." https://www.sae.org/standards/content/j2954/2_202212/
2. Mohsan, Syed Agha Hassnain, et. al. "Enabling Underwater Wireless Power Transfer towards Sixth Generation (6G) Wireless Networks: Opportunities, Recent Advances, and Technical Challenges." J. Mar. Sci. Eng. 2022, 10(9), 1282. https://www.mdpi.com/2077-1312/10/9/1282

KEYWORDS: Wireless Power Transfer; WPT; Near Field Power Transfer; Autonomous Vehicles; Wireless Charging; Casualty Power; Recoverability

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