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Vertical Axis Wind Turbines: History, Technology and Applications

<p>In  this  Master Thesis  a  review  of  different  type  of  vertical  axis  wind turbines (VAWT)  and  a preliminary investigation of a new kind of VAWT are presented.</p><p>After an introduction about the historical background of wind power, the report deals with a more accurate analysis of the main type of VAWT, showing their characteristics and their operations. The aerodynamics of the wind turbines and a review of different type on generators that can be used to connect the wind mill to the electricity grid are reported as well.</p><p>Several statistics are also presented, in order to explain how the importance of the wind energy has grown  up  during  the  last  decades  and  also  to  show  that  this development  of  the  market  of  wind power  creates  new  opportunity  also  for VAWT,  that  are  less  used  than  the  horizontal  axis  wind turbine (HAWT).</p><p>In the end of 2009 a new kind of vertical axis wind turbine, a giromill 3 blades type, has been built in Falkenberg, by the Swedish company VerticalWind. The tower of this wind turbine is made by wood,  in  order  to  get  a  cheaper  and  more environment  friendly  structure,  and  a  direct  driven synchronous multipole with permanent magnents generator is located at its bottom. This 200 kW VAWT represents the intermediate step between the 12 kW prototype, built in collaboration with the Uppsala University, and the common Swedish commercial size of 2 MW, which is the goal of the company.</p><p>A  preliminary  investigation  of  the  characteristics  of  this  VAWT  has  been done, focusing  in particular on the value of the frequency of resonance of the tower, an important value that must be never reached during the operative phase in order to avoid serious damage to all the structure, and on the power curve, used to evaluate the coefficient of power (Cp) of the turbine. The results of this investigation and  the steps  followed  to  get  them  are  reported.  Moreover  a  energy production analysis of the turbine has been done using WindPro, as well as a comparison with and older type on commercial VAWT.</p>

Identiferoai:union.ndltd.org:UPSALLA/oai:DiVA.org:hh-4986
Date January 2010
CreatorsD'Ambrosio, Marco, Medaglia, Marco
PublisherHalmstad University, Halmstad University, School of Business and Engineering (SET), Halmstad University, Halmstad University, School of Business and Engineering (SET)
Source SetsDiVA Archive at Upsalla University
LanguageEnglish
Detected LanguageEnglish
TypeStudent thesis, text

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