Design of a novel artificial intelligence technique for Cube-Sat power budget calculations

Abstract

The electrical power subsystem (EPS) is one of the most critical subsystems in a spacecraft (SC). It provides the power needed for SC loads. Any failure in the EPS leads to SC mission failure. However, power budget calculation is necessary for the analysis of the energy flow of the SC subsystems for in-orbit nominal operation and to ensure the adequacy of solar array (SA) power and storage battery capacity. The average power generated by SA of a SC should be carefully calculated to accurately estimate the energy budget process. Nevertheless, SC operational scenarios should be designed and then justified by the power budget calculation. The investigation of power capability is to satisfy the mission requirements for all nominal operating modes of the SC. The solar illumination and orbit shadow period, as well as EPS parameters including SA output power, bus voltage, load profile, and storage battery capacity graph during in-orbit nominal operation, are all taken into consideration. In this paper, a mission profile with the worst-case scenario (WCS) for EPS of a Low-earth orbit (LEO) Cube-Sat is demonstrated. Moreover, a novel energy management strategy is developed using artificial intelligence to justify the power budget calculation of SC EPS.