Sustainable and autonomous carbon-neutral aerial ecosystems and energy solutions for future metropolises

AeroPolis

Automated vehicles create new zero-carbon services for urban design. AeroPolis proposes a new take on the aerial logistics ecosystem by defining how autonomous urban-embedded micro-airports and open logistics-ready drones can redefine and advance the current technological possibilities.

Funders

European Union flag on the left and text on the right "Funded by the European Union NextGenerationEU"
Biomimetics and Intelligent Systems Group (BISG) researchers

Project information

Project duration

-

Funded by

Research Council of Finland

Project coordinator

University of Oulu

Contact information

Project leader

Project description

Solving the challenges of future transportation requires a solid understanding of the megatrends in urbanization, digitalization and energy. Automated vehicles in particular create new zero-carbon services when combined with renewable energy and urban design and attractive opportunities are found in the development of autonomous aerial vehicles, addressing greener last-mile delivery services. Several challenges in this sector are also shared throughout other fields, ideally making the related automation and energy solutions universal. AeroPolis proposes a new take on the aerial logistics ecosystem by defining how autonomous urban-embedded micro-airports and open logistics-ready drones can redefine and advance the current technological possibilities. This is then combined with a digital platform that leverages distributed ledger technologies (DLTs), advanced aerial autonomy and ground-to-air coordination approaches, and integrated hybrid renewable solar+fuel cell energy solutions.

Project partners are:

  • University of Oulu
  • University of Turku
  • Tampere University
  • Aalto University

Project results

Edelman, H.; Stenroos, J.; Peña Queralta, J.; Hästbacka, D.; Oksanen, J.; Westerlund, T. and Röning, J. (2023) Analysis of airport design for introducing infrastructure for autonomous drones. Facilities, Vol. 41 No. 15/16, pp. 85-100. DOI: 10.1108/F-11-2022-0146.

Kunz Cechinel, A.; Röning, J.; Tikanmäki, A.; DePieri, E. and Della Méa Plentz, P. (2023) Hanging Drone: An approach to UAV landing for monitoring. In Proceedings of the 20th International Conference on Informatics in Control, Automation and Robotics - Volume 1: ICINCO; ISBN 978-989-758-670-5; ISSN 2184-2809, SciTePress, pages 363-373. DOI: 10.5220/0012154900003543.

Vilkki, A. (2023) Functionalities in micro-airports. Master’s thesis. University of Oulu, Degree Programme of Mechanical Engineering.