IMPROVE ENERGY PRODUCTION BY USING HIGH EFFICIENCY SMART WIND TURBINE BLADE by JIALE LI Submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements For the degree of Doctor of Philosophy Dissertation Advisor: Professor Xiong (Bill) Yu Department of Civil Engineering CASE WESTERN RESERVE UNIVERSITY May, 2018 CASE WESTERN RESERVE UNIVERSITY SCHOOL OF GRADUTAE STUDIES We hereby approve the thesis/dissertation of Jiale Li Candidate for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy* Committee Chair Dr. Xiong Yu Committee Member Dr. Xiangwu Zeng Committee Member Dr. Yue Li Committee Member Dr. David Matthiesen Committee Member Dr. Mingguo Hong Date of Defense 3/22/2018 *We also certify that written approval has been obtained for any proprietary material contained therein. TABLE OF CONTENTS TABLE OF CONTENTS ..................................................................................................... I LIST OF TABLES .......................................................................................................... VIII LIST OF FIGURES ............................................................................................................ X ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ........................................................................................... XVI ABSTRACT ................................................................................................................. XVIII CHAPTER ONE. INTRODUCTION AND LITERATURE REVIEW ......................... 1 1.1 Background .......................................................................................................... 1 1.2 Distributed Wind .................................................................................................. 4 1.3 Research Motivation ............................................................................................ 5 1.3.1 Innovative Wind Turbine .............................................................................. 6 1.3.2 Bio-inspired Blade ........................................................................................ 8 I 1.4 Outline of Research ............................................................................................ 12 CHAPTER TWO. WIND ENERGY RESOURCES IN CLEVELAND AREA ......... 15 2.1 Introduction ........................................................................................................ 15 2.2 Methodology and Technical Background ........................................................... 15 2.2.1 Theoretical Wind Power Output ................................................................. 15 2.2.2 Weibull Distribution .................................................................................... 16 2.2.3 Wind Power Density ................................................................................... 18 2.2.4 Turbulence Intensity ................................................................................... 18 2.2.5 Capacity Factor ........................................................................................... 19 2.2.6 The Power Law Model................................................................................ 20 2.3 Description of the Measurement Sites and Equipment ...................................... 21 2.3.1 Site Description ........................................................................................... 21 II 2.3.2 Northern Power® 100kW Wind Turbine .................................................... 23 2.3.3 Vestas® V-27 and Nordex® N-54 Wind Turbines ........................................ 25 2.3.4 ZephIR® LiDAR ......................................................................................... 27 2.4 Measured Wind Data .......................................................................................... 29 2.4.1 Monitored Wind Data ................................................................................. 29 2.4.2 Spatial-temporal Analysis ........................................................................... 37 2.5 Data Characteristic ............................................................................................. 40 2.5.1 Turbulence Intensity ................................................................................... 40 2.5.2 Wind Power Density ................................................................................... 42 2.6 Validation of Monitored Data ............................................................................. 44 2.7 Conclusion .......................................................................................................... 51 CHAPTER THREE. ANALYSES OF THE EXTENSIBLE BLADE IN IMPROVING WIND ENERGY PRODUCTION ............................................................ 53 III 3.1 Overview ............................................................................................................ 53 3.2 Introduction ........................................................................................................ 54 3.3 Extensible Blade Concept .................................................................................. 55 3.3.1 Extensible Blade ......................................................................................... 55 3.3.2 Specifications of Fixed Length Wind Turbine Blade .................................. 57 3.3.3 Aerodynamic Model based on Blade Element Momentum (BEM) Theory 61 3.3.4 Validation of BEM Model in Power Output Prediction .............................. 69 3.4 Structural Analysis ............................................................................................. 71 3.4.1 Determine the Working Range of Wind Speed ........................................... 71 3.4.2 Modal Analysis ........................................................................................... 74 3.4.3 Rainflow Cycle Counting Method .............................................................. 78 3.4.4 Fatigue Damage Analysis ........................................................................... 82 IV 3.5 Test Results ........................................................................................................ 85 3.6 Conclusions ........................................................................................................ 94 CHAPTER FOUR. EXPERIMENTAL STUDY ON THE PERFORMANCE OF SMALL HORIZONTAL AXIS WIND TURBINE WITH BIO-INSPIRED BLADE ...... 97 4.1 Overview ............................................................................................................ 97 4.2 Introduction ........................................................................................................ 98 4.3 Setup of Wind Tunnel Tests.............................................................................. 100 4.3.1 Wind Tunnel Components ........................................................................ 100 4.3.2 Wind Tunnel Control System .................................................................... 102 4.4 Geometrical Design of Blade Models .............................................................. 104 4.4.1 Model Description .................................................................................... 104 4.4.2 Blade Design ..............................................................................................113 4.5 Experimental Setups ..........................................................................................114 V 4.6 Experimental Results.........................................................................................117 4.6.1 Power Coefficient Curve ............................................................................117 4.6.2 Power Output ............................................................................................ 124 4.7 Numerical Simulation and Discussions............................................................ 134 4.7.1 Introduction ............................................................................................... 134 4.7.2 Validation .................................................................................................. 134 4.7.3 Simulation Model of S1223 Airfoil .......................................................... 140 4.7.4 Modal Analysis ......................................................................................... 146 4.8 Conclusions ...................................................................................................... 151 CHAPTER FIVE. SUMMARIES AND FUTURE WORK ....................................... 154 5.1 Summaries on This Research ........................................................................... 154 5.2 Future Work ...................................................................................................... 156 VI REFERENCES ............................................................................................................... 159 VII LIST OF TABLES Table 2-1 Wind shear coefficient α from ASCE 7-05 [81] ............................................... 21 Table 2-2 Northern Power 100 wind turbine parameters .................................................. 24 Table 2-3 Vestas V-27 and Nordex N-54 wind turbine parameters [87] ........................... 27 Table 2-4 Locations and mean wind speed characteristics at 50m of the test sites .......... 30 Table 2-5 Seasonal theoretical capacity factors of the two wind turbine prototypes ........ 45 Table 2-6 V-27 wind turbine seasonal operation days and capacity factors ..................... 46 Table 2-7 N-54 wind turbine seasonal operation days and capacity factors