Effect of the opening and location ratio on the performance of an H-Darrieus VAWT

Abstract

Vertical axis wind turbines such as Darrieus turbines are a very interesting category of low wind speed domestic wind turbines. Further research work is needed to enhance their efficiency to fulfill the higher demand in small applications for power generation. The main objective of this work is to find a Darrieus turbine design to boost the starting capacity of the turbine through an opening located at the lower surface of the airfoil. We carried out a thorough CFD (Computational Fluid Dynamics) investigation to determine the impact of the opening position on the Darrieus rotor’s output. This new type of airfoil uses a standard NACA 0015 profile and a profile with an opening on the lower surface of the profile. Different sizes of the opening in a symmetrical profile are evaluated through the CFD method to predict the Cp and CT of this H-Darrieus turbine design. Five sections were designed to describe the research of this new H-Darrieus rotor. Generally speaking, the results showed that the Cp decreases with the opening ratio, the desirable rotors with the lower surface opening ratio are 0.12 to 0.36 considering this with the low CpLP.