Experimental Study for Three and Six Buckets of Sim-Savonius

Abstract

Increasing environmental concerns have led to a demand for more environmentally friendly energy options. Worldwide, wind energy is one of a clean, renewable source of green electricity. Fossil fuel is one of our most important sources of energy and its quantities are decreasing. However, wind is a renewable resource that can as stand by source with fuel. Wind turbines are used to harness the wind to generate energy. Vertical axis wind turbines (VAWTs) are suitable for use in built sites because to their outstanding features, attractiveness, low noise, and safety. To achieve these objectives, vertical axis wind turbines with multiple blades (blades are made from polyvinyl chloride (PVC) material) have been designed, manufactured and studied experimentally to investigate its performance. Turbine’s blade is a half cylinder in its shape. The blades rotational speed of the blades, the resulted torque (T), and generated power (P) of each configuration of the suggested turbine were determined for different wind speeds (1.5m/s, 2.5m/s, and 3m/s) and rotor radius of (30cm, 40cm, and50cm), respectively. The graphical relation between coefficient of power (Cp) and the tip speed ratio (TSR) and between coefficient of power (Cp) and angles of the blades were constructed. It was noted that performance of wind turbine is largely depends on wind speed, blade locations, and blade angle. The maximum value of the power coefficients (Cp = 13.056%) is noticed at 40cm and 1.5 m/s for blade radius and wind speed, respectively, specifically at TSR=1.3 and 450 blade angle. The maximum values of the Cp for all values of the effective parameters are noticed at 450 blade angle. In addition, higher values of Cp are achieved at the lower wind speeds and high blade radius, and that corresponds to higher TSR. Finally, VAWT is able to generate electricity for local use even at low wind speeds.