Performance improvement of a control valve with energy harvesting

Abstract

Providing a continuous and stable power supply to monitoring equipment in intelligent pipe network systems far from the grid is a complex and urgent problem. Ball valves are widely used in various fluid delivery systems, by adding an energy harvesting characteristic to the spool of the ball valve, a new type of ball valve with a Savonius impeller is proposed, which not only has the fluid regulation characteristics of traditional valves, but also harvests energy in the fluid. Based on CFD simulation software, the matching characteristics of valve and impeller are studied by using slip mesh technology, the energy harvesting performance of valves under different openings is analysed, and the influence of the parameter change of the overlap ratio and blade arc angle of impeller on the energy harvesting characteristics of valves is also studied. The results show that the energy harvesting performance of the valve is the best at 25% opening, the energy harvesting performance is the best at the overlap ratio Rs = 0 and Rs = 0.15, and the energy harvesting performance is better in the range of blade arc angle θ = 80°–180°.