Aerodynamic study of vertical axis wind turbines

Abstract

With respect to wind energy, there is an increasing interest in decentralized, small systems with a nominal power output of 5-25 kW. This has motivated the resurgence of interest in Vertical-Axis Wind Turbines (VAWT), that offer several advantages to the more conventional Horizontal-Axis (HAWT) machines. The VAWT is inherently omnidirectional, and hence obviates the need to provide a yawing mechanism. Due to their simpler configuration the productions costs and service effort is potentially lower than for HAWT. In one sense, the price paid for structural simplicity is aerodynamic complexity: VAWT aerodynamics is inherently unsteady, and highly nonlinear. However, recent development in CFD methods capable of prediction in detail the unsteady aerodynamics has greatly increased the understanding of VAWT aerodynamics. © 2010 Springer.