Performance Improvement of a Low-Power Wind Turbine Using Conical Sections

Janesh N. Mohanan, Kumaravel Sundaramoorthy and Ashok Sankaran
Additional contact information
Janesh N. Mohanan: Department of Electrical Engineering, National Institute of Technology Calicut, Kerala 673601, India
Kumaravel Sundaramoorthy: Department of Electrical Engineering, National Institute of Technology Calicut, Kerala 673601, India
Ashok Sankaran: Department of Electrical Engineering, National Institute of Technology Calicut, Kerala 673601, India

Energies, 2021, vol. 14, issue 17, 1-21

Abstract: This paper examines the performance of conical sections (concentrator and diffuser) to improve the energy-recovery prospects of small-scale wind turbines. Detailed simulation studies of the conical sections with convergence angle viz., concentrator, and divergence angle viz., diffuser were conducted using ANSYS Fluent ® software. Using simulation data, a trend analysis was conducted, and the empirical equations were derived for calculating the velocity variation and power variation in terms of the convergence/divergence angles. Working prototype models with optimum angles were fabricated for both the diffuser and concentrator. These models were then augmented with a wind turbine coupled with a 100 W, 24 V DC generator and tested to validate the simulation results. Upon analyzing the simulation data, it was found that a maximum velocity variation of 23.3% was achieved at an angle of 4.5° for the diffuser, whereas a maximum power variation of 65.1% was achieved at an angle of 3.6° for the same diffuser. The aforementioned improvement was achieved by optimizing divergence angle alone. The proposed designs of the diffuser- and concentrator-augmented wind turbine, as well as the empirical equations for calculating the velocity variation and power variation in terms of the divergence and convergence angle, are the major contributions of this article.

Keywords: CFD analysis; concentrator; convergent angle; diffuser; divergence angle; wind energy (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: Q Q0 Q4 Q40 Q41 Q42 Q43 Q47 Q48 Q49 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2021
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.mdpi.com/1996-1073/14/17/5233/pdf (application/pdf)
https://www.mdpi.com/1996-1073/14/17/5233/ (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:gam:jeners:v:14:y:2021:i:17:p:5233-:d:620779

Access Statistics for this article

Energies is currently edited by Ms. Agatha Cao

More articles in Energies from MDPI
Bibliographic data for series maintained by MDPI Indexing Manager ().