Facebook is ready to test its first full-scale solar drone. This enormous unmanned aerial vehicle is called Aquila. The concept is that Aquila will circle in the stratosphere, above the weather, wirelessly beaming Internet signals to base stations in remote parts of the world.
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Though as wide as a 737, the drone weighs hundreds of times less than the commercial airliner, thanks to a carbon-fiber frame. According to Facebook’s Yael Maguire, who oversees the project, the goal is to reach a point where the drone can stay aloft for 90 days at an altitude of between 60,000 and 90,000 feet. “We think this is a very ambitious goal, given that the world record, as far as we can tell, is about two weeks.”
Meanwhile, at a lab in Woodland Hills, California, another group of Facebook engineers is developing new laser networking technologies that can help the drone beam its Internet signals down to earth. Maguire indicated that the group has designed and tested a laser that can deliver data at “10s of Gbits per second,” hitting a target the size of a dime at a distance of 10 miles.
Developed under the aegis of a researcher group dubbed the Facebook Connectivity Lab, the Aquila project is just one of many efforts to deliver Internet access from the skies. Google is testing its own solar-powered drones—crashing one earlier this year—and it’s designing enormous balloons that can already stay aloft at similar heights for upwards of 180 days. Facebook and others are also exploring satellites that provide Internet signals from higher altitudes.
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At Facebook and Google, these projects carry ulterior motives. The companies believe that if they expand the reach of the Internet, they’ll expand the reach of their businesses. Neither company plans to operate their own sky-high Internet services; they plan on handing these aerials to existing providers such as Vodafone. But these projects still have a long way to go. “There are many challenges ahead,” says Phil Finnegan, an analyst with the Virginia-based research outfit The Teal Group, who specializes in unmanned aerial vehicles. “Technologies are improving, but we’re not there yet.”
Though these planes are light and can power themselves via solar energy, Facebook must also find ways for the drones to carry all the equipment needed to deliver Internet signals, says Danny Ellis, the CEO of drone company SkySpecs, who has closely followed the project. Added weight could affect speed, but he believes that Facebook’s goal of a 90-day flight time is very doable. “Long-term, this is definitely a feasible idea,” he says. “We’ve already seen similar aircraft that can fly around the globe.”
In so many ways, this is a complex project. But Maguire and Facebook are very much committed to making it happen. The company’s social network now serves 1.3 billion people worldwide. But there are so many more to reach.
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Source: wired