Abstract
An experimental and analytical method to evaluate the performance of a loop-type wind turbine generator is presented. The loop-type wind turbine is a horizontal axis wind turbine with a different shaped blade. A computational fluid dynamics analysis and experimental studies were conducted in this study to validate the performance of the computational fluid dynamics method, when compared with the experimental results obtained for a 1/15 scale model of a 3 kW wind turbine. Furthermore, the performance of a full sized wind turbine is predicted. The computational fluid dynamics analysis revealed a sufficiently large magnitude of external flow field, indicating that no factor influences the flow other than the turbine. However, the experimental results indicated that the wall surface of the wind tunnel significantly affects the flow, due to the limited cross-sectional size of the wind tunnel used in the tunnel test. The turbine power is overestimated when the blockage ratio is high; thus, the results must be corrected by defining the appropriate blockage factor (the factor that corrects the blockage ratio). The turbine performance was corrected using the Bahaj method. The simulation results showed good agreement with the experimental results. The performance of an actual 3 kW wind turbine was also predicted by computational fluid dynamics.
Highlights
Renewable energy sources are gaining increasing interest, as they play a significant role in satisfying growing energy demands
This study aimed to evaluate the performance of a loop-type wind turbine that has never been investigated
To evaluate the performance of this new turbine, a 1/15 scale 3D printed model was investigated by simultaneously using a wind tunnel test and 3D computational fluid dynamics (CFD) analysis
Summary
Renewable energy sources are gaining increasing interest, as they play a significant role in satisfying growing energy demands. Companies involved in the production of commercial wind power generators are already producing large megawatt (MW) class wind turbines, with rotor diameters exceeding 100 m. No significant attention has been paid to the production of small wind turbines until recently, when they started to attract attention due to the global investments and research in smart grid projects. Smart grids can maximize energy efficiency by integrating information and communication technologies into electric power grids, and monitoring electricity usage and supply in real time. Based on these information and communication technologies, small-sized power generation systems have emerged in the smart grid context, because prosumers produce electricity at the same time as existing users consume electricity.
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