Energy Efficiency of UAV-Based Communication Systems Powered via Energy Harvesting Through Trajectory Optimization

Unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV), also known as drones, is an aircraft without a human pilot onboard and controlled simultaneously by computers remotely. UAVs have been employed in different applications which include fire fighting, security, data coverage, and information transformation. UAVs represent a key technology for next-generation wireless networks that support internet of things (IoT) systems and smart cities. UAV communication systems provide wireless connectivity for various emerging applications (medical, military, telecommunications). UAVs allow for the improvement of cellular coverage and the collection of data from IoT devices located in dangerous and disastrous environments. Also, these systems support the exponential growth of connected devices. However, one of the bottlenecks of UAV communications systems is power consumption. Most of the UAV energy is consumed on the propulsion part which affects the ability of the UAV to transfer information. Since employing high storage battery is inapplicable to solve this problem due to the battery cost and weight, other techniques have been used to solve this problem. Energy harvesting, such as wind or solar energy, is a promising key technology for greening future wireless networks that incorporate UAV systems to reduce network operating costs and carbon footprints. Trajectory optimization is another technique to minimize the energy consumption of propulsion. The overall objective of this thesis is to provide a solution to tackle the UAV energy efficiency constraint. This thesis presents an energy efficiency scheme based on simultaneously powering a UAV with solar energy and optimizing the trajectory to increase the energy efficiency of the drone. This approach has not only been shown to increase the energy efficiency of the drone but also decrease the carbon footprints.