Feasibility Study of a 10 MW MgB2 Fully Superconducting Generator for Offshore Wind Turbines

Offshore wind is considered a vital component of the future large scale renewable generation portfolio. Intense R&D effort is occurring in both the technology and the supply chain aiming at cost reduction. The drivetrain of wind turbines is an area of continuous evolution with currently no one standard configuration in the industry. It is...

Conceptual design of a DOT farm generator station

The Delft Offshore Turbine (DOT) is a DUWIND research project that focuses on reducing the cost of offshore wind energy by bringing a radical change in offshore wind turbine technology. The main concept is to centralize electricity generation by having individual wind turbines create a flow of pressurized seawater to a hydropower station. The...

MicroDOT: Design of a 10W prototype of the Delft offshore turbine

The Delft Offshore Turbine (DOT) project is a research project within DUWIND. The main objective of the project is to reduce the costs of offshore wind energy through technical solutions. A defining characteristic of the DOT concept is the fluid power transmission. The next step for the DOT concept is to make a full preliminary design. A helpful...

Dynamic modeling of fluid power transmissions for wind turbines

Fluid power transmission for wind turbines is quietly gaining more ground/interest. The principle of the various concepts presented so far is to convert aerodynamic torque of the rotor blades into a pressurized fluid flow by means of a positive displacement pump. At the other end of the fluid power circuit, the pressurized flow is converted back...

Estimation of the vibration decrement of an offshore wind turbine support structure caused by its interaction with soil

Safety in offshore engineering an academic course covering safety in offshore wind

Offshore projects are known for their challenging conditions, generally leading to high risks. Therefore no offshore project can go without a continuous and extensive assessment on safety issues. The Delft University of Technology is currently developing a course "Safety in Offshore Engineering" which deals with the entire scope of safety...

Influence of a boatlanding and j-tubes on wave loads and wall thickness of the monopile support structure design

Support structures for offshore wind turbines play a significant part in the cost of offshore wind energy. With current access systems a conventional boat landing is not necessary. Secondary steel, such as a boat landing and J-tube, influences wave loads. A way of taking the secondary steel items into account in the wave load calculation is...

Atmospheric stability and wind profile climatology over the North Sea: Case study at Egmond aan Zee

The statistics of atmospheric stability and non-dimensional wind profiles are studied using the standard surface-layer theory at Egmond aan Zee in the North Sea. Measurements at 21, 70 and 116 m are used to validate the theoretical profiles. Charnock’s relation is used to estimate the sea surface roughness. Bulk Richardson number is used to...

An Analytical Model of Wake Deflection Due to Shear Flow

The main motivation behind this work is to create a purely analytical engineering model for wind turbine wake upward deflection due to shear flow, by developing a closed form solution of the velocity field due to an oblique vortex ring. The effectiveness of the model is evaluated by comparing the results with those of a free-wake model. The...

System ID Modern Control Algorithms for Active Aerodynamic Load Control and Impact on Gearbox Loading

Prior work on active aerodynamic load control (AALC) of wind turbine blades has demonstrated that appropriate use of this technology has the potential to yield significant reductions in blade loads, leading to a decrease in wind cost of energy. While the general concept of AALC is usually discussed in the context of multiple sensors and active...

Aerodynamic characteristics of wind turbine blade airfoils at high angles-of-attack

Airfoil characteristics at deep stall angles were investigated. It appeared that the maximum drag coefficient as a function of the airfoil upwind y/c ordinate at x/c=0.0125 can be approximated by a straight line. The lift-drag ratios in deep stall of a number of airfoils with moderate lower surface thickness coincide. It was found that the lift...

Controller Design Automation for Aeroservoelastic Design Optimization of Wind Turbines

The purpose of this paper is to integrate the controller design of wind turbines with structure and aerodynamic analysis and use the final product in the design optimization process (DOP) of wind turbines. To do that, the controller design is automated and integrated with an aeroelastic simulation tool. This integrated tool is linked with an...

Experimental and Numerical Investigation of the Effect of Rotor Blockage on Wake Expansion

A detailed quantitative description of the aerodynamics of a horizontal axis wind turbine (HAWT) is difficult due to complexity of the flow field. Several methods from experimental to analytical are used to investigate the aerodynamics of a HAWT. In the present study, a wind tunnel experiment and computational fluid dynamics (CFD) simulations...

An Analytical Model to Extract Wind Turbine Blade Structural Properties for Optimization and Up-scaling Studies

A wind turbine blade has a complex shape and consists of different elements with dissimilar material properties. To do any aeroelastic simulation, the structural properties of the blade such as stiffnesses and mass per unit length should be known in advance, and extracting these properties is a difficult task. This paper presents an analytical...

Determination of unsteady loads on a DU96W180 airfoil with actuated flap using particle image velocimetry

The unsteady flow conditions experienced by wind turbine blades lead to fatigue loads due to gusts, that increase the cost of energy. The decrease of the impact of these unsteady loads will most certainly lead to a decrease of the cost of energy. In order to alleviate unsteady loads the Smart Rotor Blade approach [2] applies spanwise-distributed...

Rotational Augmentation Disparities in the MEXICO and UAE Phase VI Experiments

Wind turbine structures and components suffer excessive loads and premature failures when key aerodynamic phenomena are not well characterized, fail to be understood, or are inaccurately predicted. Turbine blade rotational augmentation remains incompletely characterized and understood, thus limiting robust prediction for design. Pertinent...

Aerodynamic Analysis of a Vertical Axis Wind Turbine in a Diffuser

Wind energy in the urban environment faces complex and often unfavorable wind conditions. High turbulence, lower average wind velocities and rapid changes in the wind direction are common phenomena in the complex built environments. A possible way to improve the cost-efficiency of urban wind turbines is the application of flowenhancing...

Aeroelastic Modelling and Comparison of Advanced Active Flap Control Concepts for Load Reduction on the Upwind 5MW Wind Turbine

A newly developed comprehensive aeroelastic model is used to investigate active flap concepts on the Upwind 5MW reference wind turbine. The model is specially designed to facilitate distributed control concepts and advanced controller design. Different concepts of centralized and distributed control schemes based on choices of realistic...