Aerodynamics of Wind Turbines

Hiroshi Imamura
Department of Mechanical Engineering and Material Science, Yokohama National University, 79-5 Tokiwadai, Hodogaya-ku, Yokohama 240-8501, Japan

1. INTRODUCTION Efficient use of wind turbine as the electric power generator has been developed by application of aerodynamics for rotor blade. Airfoil has made rotor possible to rotate in high speed and load. Early aerodynamics of wind turbine has based on theory of airplane and helicopter rotor. However, aerodynamics of wind turbine has been required different idea from helicopter rotor. For example, the accuracy of rotor performance analysis depends mainly on the treatment of wake effect, because the wake of propeller type wind turbine is induced a large velocity in rotor plane. Progress of aerodynamics of wind turbine has ensured the new concept design turbines such as a stall controlled machine. As the use of large scale commercial wind turbines is expanded over the world, the wind turbine industry is facing many difficulties in consulting efficient wind turbine machines, which is caused by the inability to adequately predict structural loading and power output. As the wind turbines are operating in the natural environment, turbines are always subjected to unsteady nature. However, recognizing on aerodynamics of wind turbine associated with threedimensional, unsteady and separated complex flow is not sufficient. The unsteady aerodynamics of wind turbines is one of the most incentive issues in wind energy research and development [1,2,3]. The subjects on aerodynamics of wind turbines such as design of new airfoil [4,5,6], three-dimensional effect of rotating blade [7,8], dynamic inflow effect [9,10] dynamic stall associated with yawed inflow [11] and

so on are now actively studied. In this article the basic issues and some current topics on aerodynamics of horizontal axis wind turbines (HAWT) which are of majority of current operating turbines are surveyed. 2. AIRFOIL For HAWT blades the aviation airfoils such as NACA series have been widely used. But these airfoils have been recognized to be insufficient for requirements such as reduction of rapid stall characteristics, insensitivity to wide Reynolds number in the range of between 500,000 and 2 million, insensitivity to leading edge roughness and structural efficiency for root region where is designed using a thick airfoil. New airfoil families for HAWT are designing in Delft University of Technology [4], National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) [5] and Riso National Laboratory [6], et al.. Figure 1 shows an example of airfoils for HAWT blades [6]. 3. ROTOR PERFORMANCE ANALYSIS Rotor performance analysis of HAWT has been performed using several methods as shown in table 1. In these methods a Blade Element Momentum (BEM) method is mainly employed as a tool of performance analysis for HAWT because of their simplicity and readily implementation. Vortex wake methods can adequately treat the effect of wake vorTable 1: Analysis methods of HAWT performance Method Model Researcher Actuator disk Betz [12] Momentum Blade element Wilson [13] Lifting line Afjeh [14] Vortex wake Lifting surface Simoes [15] Local circulation Elliptic blade Azuma [16] Acceleration poten- Pressure pervan Bussel [17] tial turbation CFD RANS Duque [18]

Figure 1: Profiles of Riso A1- series airfoil [6]

tices and have some advantages over BEM, but need computation burden. As computer power increases, use of vortex wake methods is increased, and CFD codes are also applied in the resent aspect. This section follows the features of each method on performance analysis of HAWT. 3.1 Blade Element Momentum Method Most wind turbine design codes are based on Blade Element Momentum (BEM) method [13]. The basic of BEM method assumes the blade can be analyzed as a number of independent element in spanwise direction. The induced velocity at each element is determined by performing the momentum balance for an annular control volume containing the blade element. The aerodynamic forces on the element are calculated using the lift and drag coefficient from the empirical two-dimensional wind tunnel test data at the geometric angle of attack (AOA) of the blade element relative to the local flow velocity. BEM methods have aspects by reasonable tool for designer, but are not suitable for accurate estimation of the effect of wake, the complex flow such as three-dimensional flow or dynamic stall because of their assumptions. 3.2 Vortex Wake Method The induced velocity in the rotor plane of HAWT is largely increased in a heavy loading condition and the wake vortices of HAWT develop to the downstream constructing highly skewed vortex sheet (see fig.2) in a largely decelerated axial flow near the rotor plane. Thus, the determination of the velocity induced by wake and wake geometry is one of the most important aspects in the rotor performance analysis. Vortex wake method directly calculates the induced velocity from the bound vortices of blades and the trailing vortex in wake which are represented by lifting line [14] or lifting surface model [15]. The treatment of wake geometry can be classified roughly into two types, as a prescribed wake model [14] and a free wake model [15]. In the former model the wake represented by a line vortex or spiral vortices with fixed pitch. In the latter one, a fractional step scheme is adopted and the configurations of the wake are calculated at every time step using a local velocity including the components induced by wake and bound vortices. The free wake model is generally tackled with vortex lattice method which can fit on arbitrary blade shape with camber, taper and twist. Vortex wake methods are of accurate

Figure 2: Wake visualization of 10m HAWT by NREL (quotation by courtesy of NREL)

Figure 3: Tip vortex and pressure contours of a rotor flow using EllipSys2D/3D code by Risoe national laboratory (quotation by courtesy of Risoe laboratory)

treatment of the wake effect such as yawed inflow or dynamic inflow, but they was not common tool for design of turbines because of their computation burden. However, their use are increasing with increase of computer power. An other method to the vortex wake methods is use of an asymptotic acceleration potential [17]. Acceleration potential method is basis on the Lapace equation of pressure perturbation. The rotor blades are represented in the model as discrete surfaces on which a pressure discontinuity is present. The model implies the presence of spanwise and chordwise pressure distributions, which are composed of analytical asymptotic solutions for Laplace equation. The asymptotic acceleration method gives a possibility to simplify or elaborate the model in specific areas of interests. In its simplest form the model is equivalent to the lifting line model with delinearized wake. More elaborated models makes it possible to calculate the dynamic loads caused by dynamic inflow [10] and yawed inflow [11] situations. 3.3 CFD Recent development of the computational fluid dynamics (CFD) allows us to simulate overall flow

around HAWT including tower and nacelle. In 1999 Duque et al. [18] calculated aerodynamics of a HAWT using the RANS model and overset grids to facilitate the simulation of flows about complex configurations. Recently, some CFD codes actively are developed. Figure 3 shows an example of CFD analysis of a rotor flow by three-dimensional NavierStokes code. Though the state of the art CFD is needed considerable computer power and validations for Navier-Stokes model, CFD has potential advantage for the detailed understanding of aerodynamics of HAWT. 4. UNSTEADY ROTOR AERODYNAMICS Wind turbines in the open air field are always exposed to the operating conditions in a very instationary environment. The aerodynamic loads on blades and structures consequently are of an instationary nature. Therefore, the clarifications of the dynamic effects on the load and dynamic behavior of wind turbines in such conditions are quite important for the design of the wind turbine. 4.1 Yawed Inflow When incoming flow into the rotor is yawed to the rotor plane, due to the rapid and periodical change of the local AOA to the rotor blade, the dynamic load to the rotor is excited by the dynamic stall effect. Figure 4 shows the experimental result according to the azimuthal change on the upper surface pressure distribution at 30% span position in a yawed flow and low tip speed ratio condition for down-wind type HAWT [2]. The blade passes behind the tower at 180 degree of azimuth angle. Because the dynamic stall vortex is induced by rapid change of local AOA, the large and transient leading edge suction pressure peaks were formed. This causes the significant lift enhancement and the periodical load to the blades. Figure 5 shows the normal force coefficient for yaw angle of 30 degree at 30% and 63% span. The hysteresis loop shows significantly different between inboard and outboard locations. In natural environment, when inflow turbulence is added, effecting both inflow magnitude and direction, the flow becomes more three-dimensional and the dynamic stall effect becomes much more complex [3]. 4.2 Dynamic Inflow Dynamic inflow concerns with large scale un-

Figure 4: Upper surface pressure distribution vs azimuth angle; yaw angle of 30 degree and 30% span position [2]

Figure 5: Normal force coefficient vs angle of attack at 30% and 63% span positions; yaw angle of 30 degree. Dashed line is 2D static wind tunnel test data [2].

steady rotor aerodynamics, such as coherent wind gusts, collective blade pitch and rotor speed variations. Dynamic inflow accounts for the influence of time varying trailing wake vortices on the inflow velocity in the rotor plane. The vorticity is formed at the blade and convected downstream with local total velocity, partly wake induced. Equally, the strength of trailing and shed vortices depends on the wake through its effect on the angles of attack. Dynamic inflow phenomena depend mainly on the trailing vortices, the shed near wake being accounted for through unsteady profile aerodynamics. The characteristic time scale for this phenomenon is rotor diameter / inflow velocity. For large turbines, this will be of the order of 5 to 10s. Phenomena having a time scale large compared to this may be regarded as quasi-steady.

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[6] Figure 6: Spanwise load distribution for stepwise variation in wind speed [9]

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[10] Figure 7: Measured and calculated flapping moment at inboard position for step on the pitch angle [10].

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Figure 6 shows an example of spanwise load distribution when the wind speed is varied in stepwise [9]. Figure 7 shows comparison of the measured and calculated flapping moment at inboard blade position for step on the pitch angle [10]. Free and prescribed vortex wake model and acceleration potential method were employed for simulation. The measurements appear to be in a good qualitative and quantitative agreement with the calculated results. 5. CONCLUSIONS This articlepresentedthe basic issues on aerodynamics of HAWT. Recognition of three dimensional, unsteady separated flow field around the HAWT is indispensable to develop aerodynamics of wind turbines. Cooperative research projects on these subjects are now actively conducting by institutes in EU and USA. References
[1] Hansen, A.C. and Butterfield, C.P., Aerodynamics of Horizontal-Axis Wind Turbines, Annu. Rev. of Fluid Mech., 1993, pp.115-149.

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