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Article history:
Received 16 June 2012
Received in revised form
22 October 2012
Accepted 22 December 2012
Available online 28 January 2013
A novel application of modern active ow control on vertical axis wind turbine (VAWT) dynamic stall is
explored in this paper. Operation of VAWT at low blade speed ratios offers numerous noise and safety
advantages over higher blade speed ratios but suffer from dynamic stall that degrades their
performance. Consequently, an experimental investigation was carried out on VAWT operating at
low blade speed ratios that employed synthetic jets as a means of active ow control. Large angles of
attack on VAWT rotor blades were simulated by sinusoidal oscillation of a thick NACA 0020 turbine
blade about its quarter-chord. The pressure distribution and thrust hysteresis results showed synthetic
jet actuation to be effective when dynamic stall effects were present, and clearly demonstrated that
they could be utilised to improve low blade speed ratio VAWT performance and thus enhance turbine
safety and noise. The ndings from this study have signicant practical implications for the design and
development of safe and efcient wind turbines, both small- and large-scale, and further the cause of
wind as a viable renewable energy source.
& 2013 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
Keywords:
Wind energy
Vertical axis wind turbine
Synthetic jets
Dynamic stall
1. Introduction
Fossil fuel use has powered modern technological revolutions
over the last century and resulted in detrimental emissions of
carbon and greenhouse gases into the atmosphere. However,
depletion of this nite resource and the potentially disastrous
effects of climate change on the environment have led to the
development and global deployment of wind turbines as a means
of harnessing clean renewable energies over the past decade.
Although horizontal axis wind turbines (HAWT) are considered more efcient than their vertical axis wind turbine (VAWT)
counterparts and are more commonly used as large turbines in
wind farms, the inherent axisymmetric design of VAWT precludes
the need for complex and expensive yaw control systems
required for HAWT, and allows gearboxes and generators to be
simply located on the ground. This arrangement, therefore, offers
the distinct advantages over HAWT by allowing easy access for
turbine maintenance and reducing structural loads on turbine
towers to reduce maintenance, material and installation costs.
VAWT at low rotational speeds produce lower turbine noise
and mechanical vibrations, and have decreased rotational kinetic
energy which can consequently increase their operational safety.
However, rotation of the turbine blades about the vertical shaft as
depicted in Fig. 1 induces a ow velocity relative to the blades,
0167-6105/$ - see front matter & 2013 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jweia.2012.12.015
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J. Yen, N.A. Ahmed / J. Wind Eng. Ind. Aerodyn. 114 (2013) 1217
13
Salmon and Ahmed, 2004; Shun and Ahmed, 2011, 2012; Simpson
et al., 2000, 2002; Wu and Ahmed, 2011; Yen and Ahmed, 2012;
Yen and Ahmed, in press).
Active ow control using synthetic jets has received much
attention in the last decade (Glezer and Amitay, 2002; Glezer,
2011) due to their efcacy in mitigating ow separation and
delaying stall on static aircraft wings. Synthetic jets are formed
entirely from the ambient uid by oscillating a piston or diaphragm
enclosed within a cavity exiting through an orice. Actuation
transfers momentum to energise the local ow, but zero-net mass
transfer obviates the need for external reservoirs and complex
plumbing traditionally required for steady blowing or suction.
Consequently, synthetic jets are environmentally clean as no extra
gas or combustion by-products are introduced into the atmosphere.
Furthermore, the recent development of smart materials with very
low power actuation requirements, allowing feasible implementation of synthetic jet actuators in aircraft wings, has made them an
attractive alternative active ow control method.
Unfortunately, most studies that have employed synthetic jets
to study turbine blade performance enhancement have been
restricted to static tests. For example, synthetic jet actuation on
static IAI Pr8-SE (Stalnov et al., 2010) and NACA 4415 (Maldonado
et al., 2010) airfoils was found to have a benecial effect on blade
aerodynamic performance by delaying airfoil stall, decreasing
drag and reducing blade structural vibrations. As far as the
authors are aware, though, no equivalent studies incorporating
turbine dynamic stall effects, which are signicant on VAWT
particularly at low blade speed ratios, have been conducted.
The objective of this paper, therefore, is to describe such a
study that was performed to investigate if synthetic jets could
improve low blade speed ratio VAWT performance when the
dynamic motion of turbine blades and dynamic stall effects are
included, and consequently enhance turbine operational safety.
2. Experimental setup
Experiments were carried out in a 0.76 m diameter open
section wind tunnel which has a maximum turbulence intensity
of 0.2% (Ahmed and Archer, 2001b). A thick turbine blade with
NACA 0020 prole was used and, with 207.5 mm chord and
300 mm span lengths, adequately enclosed a plenum chamber
to generate the synthetic jet. Endplates were installed to reduce
three-dimensional spanwise effects and a total of 25 pressure
tappings were installed at the leading-edge, and on the upper and
lower surfaces. Pressure tappings located above the plenum
chamber were installed by tting 0.9 mm inner diameter brass
tube into pre-drilled holes from the upper surface, through the
plenum chamber and into the blade with irregularities on the
upper surface carefully removed. The freestream wind velocity
was set to VW 10 ms 1 corresponding to a chord Reynolds
Number of Rec 1.25 105.
Although the angle of attack for the turbine blade is given by
Eq. (1), a simpler sinusoidal motion was applied in this preliminary investigation to incorporate the unsteady, dynamic effects.
Sinusoidal motion about the quarter-chord was achieved using a
motor and metal disk-conrod arrangement shown schematically
in Fig. 2. The conrod location on the metal disk determined the
oscillation amplitude which was xed at Da 401. Four low blade
speed ratios of l 2.9, 2.4, 2 and 1.6, which experience angles of
attack up to 7201, 7251, 7301 and 7401 respectively as given
by Eq. (1), were investigated by altering the mean angle of attack
to am 01, 51, 101 and 201 using an adjustable motor stand.
Synthetic jet actuation was achieved using a modied air
compressor connected to the internal plenum chamber that exited
through a w1 mm wide spanwise slot located at x/c 0.028;
14
J. Yen, N.A. Ahmed / J. Wind Eng. Ind. Aerodyn. 114 (2013) 1217
J. Yen, N.A. Ahmed / J. Wind Eng. Ind. Aerodyn. 114 (2013) 1217
15
Fig. 3. Instantaneous pressure distributions for l 2:4; (a) baseline and (b) actuation.
Fig. 4. Thrust hysteresis loops for (a) l 2:9 and (b) l 2:4.
Fig. 5. Instantaneous pressure distributions for l 2; (a) baseline and (b) actuation.
16
J. Yen, N.A. Ahmed / J. Wind Eng. Ind. Aerodyn. 114 (2013) 1217
Fig. 6. Thrust hysteresis loops for (a) l 2:0 and (b) l 1:6.
4. Conclusion
3.2. Discussion
The results suggested how synthetic jet actuation can enhance
the performance of VAWT that operate at low blade speed ratios
and suffer from detrimental dynamic stall effects. Firstly, actuation increased the baseline maximum thrust coefcient which
would result in more energy extracted from the ow and
increased power generated by the turbine.
For moderate dynamic stall behaviour similar to l 2.0, synthetic jet actuation prevented the leading-edge suction collapse and
maintained attached ow to the blade surface after the maximum
angle of attack was obtained. The consequent increased thrust
coefcient, reduced hysteresis size and suppression of leading-edge
vortices would therefore increase the RMS power and reduce the
magnitude of oscillations in power typically observed at low blade
speed ratios (McLaren et al., 2011). On the other hand, while
synthetic jet actuation could not prevent ow separation for
l 1.6, it was able to delay the formation and shedding of
leading-edge vortices to higher angles of attack and reduce their
strength. Therefore, careful timing of vortex shedding could prevent, or at least improve, downstream blade pass performance for
J. Yen, N.A. Ahmed / J. Wind Eng. Ind. Aerodyn. 114 (2013) 1217
The ndings from this study suggest that the novel application
of synthetic jets to VAWT will expand their operating conditions
to include lower blade speed ratios that enhance turbine safety,
and thus positively impact both small- and large-scale VAWT to
further promote the cause of renewable wind energy as an
alternative and viable source of energy.
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