Flying kites the size of passenger jets could soon power entire cities, and a breakthrough simulation just showed they can do it together

Flying kites the size of passenger jets could soon power entire cities, and a breakthrough simulation just showed they can do it together.

Picture an aircraft the size of a commercial passenger jet—stretching 139 feet from wingtip to wingtip—operating without an engine, runway, or pilot. Tethered securely to the ground, it carves massive figure-eights through offshore winds exceeding 180 miles per hour, pulling a cable that drives a generator below.

Airborne wind energy systems promise access to stronger, steadier winds using a fraction of the raw steel and concrete required by conventional turbines.

Yet two engineering questions shadowed the technology: can a kite this massive hold its course in turbulence, and could multiple kites share the same sky safely?

Yet two engineering questions shadowed the technology: can a kite this massive hold its course in turbulence, and could multiple kites share the same sky safely? A pioneering virtual simulation framework was built specifically to uncover the answer.

Wind energy’s next frontier: Kites instead of turbines

Conventional wind turbines have grown remarkably large, but size brings steep diminishing returns. Material costs skyrocket exponentially as turbine blades lengthen, and engineers face physical limits on how tall a rigid steel tower can safely stand.

Airborne wind energy offers a radical alternative. Instead of anchoring a massive tower, a tethered fixed-wing aircraft climbs into high-altitude corridors where winds blow far stronger and more consistently.

The kite reels its tether in and out in repeating pumping cycles, driving a ground generator below.

Scaling this concept to commercial megawatt utility capacity requires answering tough questions about severe wind turbulence and shared airspace.

Building a virtual wind tunnel for flying kites

A research team at UCLouvain created a high-fidelity simulation environment sophisticated enough to model these complex flight interactions simultaneously. It is the large-eddy simulation (LES) — widely regarded as the gold standard.

Their framework combines large-eddy simulation—the gold standard in fluid dynamics for modeling atmospheric turbulence—with a full six-degree-of-freedom kite dynamics model.

The main wing uses an actuator line method to distribute aerodynamic forces realistically across its span, while control surfaces are modeled analytically. Flying the kite through this turbulent digital atmosphere is an automated model predictive controller, which continuously adjusts flight controls in real time.

The test subject: the MegAWES reference aircraft, a 139-foot wingspan megawatt-class kite flying figure-eight paths at a cruising speed of 124 miles per hour.

Flying solo: How a kite handles turbulent wind

Initial simulations evaluated a single kite battling turbulent wind streams with 6% turbulence intensity—a benchmark typical for offshore wind conditions.

The results were remarkably encouraging. The automated flight controller tracked its reference path with high precision, keeping position error under 15% of its wingspan across six power cycles.

Average electricity output matched the targeted 1.38 megawatts within a 0.8% error margin, proving turbulence does not degrade power production. Furthermore, the kite’s aerodynamic wake proved far weaker than a standard turbine’s, creating only a 6% velocity deficit compared to a 30% drop behind traditional blades.

Because the kite sweeps across a dynamic flight path rather than spinning a solid rotor disk, its time-averaged wake stays remarkably low.

Two kites, one airspace: Wake interaction in tandem flight

With single-kite behavior established, researchers placed a second kite directly behind the first in tandem formation to test airspace interaction across two scenarios.

In the first scenario, both kites flew in-phase—at the same point in their pumping cycles simultaneously. As the lead kite’s wake drifted downstream, the second kite shifted naturally into its reel-in phase, completely dodging the disturbed air. Both aircraft produced 1.4 megawatts with zero performance penalty.

In a harsher out-of-phase scenario, the second kite flew directly through the leader’s wake during power generation.

Trajectory tracking stayed stable, though power output dropped by 6%, leaving the two kites producing 1.38 megawatts and 1.30 megawatts respectively.

What this means for airborne wind farms

The most crucial finding is that timing matters enormously.

Flying kites in coordinated phase alignment allows trailing craft to operate in unperturbed flow, completely eliminating wake losses through flight path control alone.

Even in uncoordinated worst-case scenarios, a 6% power drop is surprisingly mild—substantially lower than wake losses accepted in traditional offshore wind farms today.

Most importantly, this groundbreaking study delivers the ultimate verdict: giant passenger-jet-sized kites can fly together in dense airborne farms, unlocking clean wind energy capable of powering entire cities.

You can find the full stusy here: Crismer, J.-B., Haas, T., Duponcheel, M., and Winckelmans, G.: Large-eddy simulation of airborne wind energy systems flying in turbulent wind using model predictive control, Wind Energ. Sci., 11, 2669–2694, https://doi.org/10.5194/wes-11-2669-2026, 2026.

Kelly Lippke

Kelly is an experienced writer with 15 years of experience exploring the big stories that shape our world, from tech breakthroughs and space exploration to climate, energy, and the fascinating quirks of science. She has a talent for turning complex ideas into sharp, memorable insights that stay with readers long after they’ve finished reading.