Tests upon Savonius turbine and its usage in street lighting pole

Abstract

The tendency nowadays is to reduce the consumption of conventional energy and to efficiently use renewable energy resources. Thus, the energy independence of the different consumers is tried, along which is the street lighting. There are many applications where street lighting is powered by renewable energy, using photovoltaic panels. This article presents a different solution for powering street lighting, with the help of wind energy, through Savonius turbines. A Savonius wind turbine with the overlap ratio of blades of 0.35 is tested, in order to determine its actual power coefficient and power extracted from the wind. According to the tests, a power coefficient of 0.3 was obtained for wind speeds of 4 and 5 m/s and the maximum power at a wind speed of 7 m/s. With the values obtained, for this type of turbine, different configurations of Savonius turbines have been dimensioned to supply an energy-efficient street lighting pole.