A Sea Trial of Wave Power Plant With Impulse Turbine

Abstract

A sea trial of wave power plant using an impulse turbine with coreless generator has been carried out at Niigata-nishi Port, in order to demonstrate usefulness of the turbine for wave energy conversion. Oscillating water column (OWC) based wave power plant has been installed at the side of a breakwater and has an air chamber with a sectional area of 4 m2 (= 2m × 2m). The impulse turbine used in the sea trial has fixed guide vanes both upstream and downstream, and these geometries are symmetrical with respect to the rotor centerline in order to rotate in a single direction in bi-directional airflow generated by OWC. The turbine is operated at lower rotational speed in comparison with conventional turbines. The rotor has a tip diameter of 458 mm, a hub-to-tip ratio of 0.7, a tip clearance of 1 mm, a chord length of 82.8 mm and a solidity of 2.0. The guide vane with chord length of 107.4 mm is symmetrically installed at the distance of 30.7 mm downstream and upstream of the rotor. The guide vane has a solidity of 2.27, a thickness ratio of 0.0279, a guide vane setting angle of 30° and a camber angle of 60°. The generator is coreless type and can generate electricity at lower rotational speed in comparison with conventional generator. The rated and maximum powers of the generator are 450 W and 880 W respectively. The experimental data obtained in the sea trial of wave power plant with the impulse turbine having coreless generator was compared to these of Wells turbine which is the mainstream of the turbine for wave energy conversion. As a result, total efficiency of the plant using the impulse turbine was higher than that of Wells turbine.