Fluid–Structure Interaction Analysis of Wind Turbines
This work presents a collection of numerical methods combined into a single framework for aerodynamic and FSI modeling and simulation of wind turbines. The numerical formulation of the Navier–Stokes equations of incompressible flows is validated using experimental data for a full-scale wind turbine. The structural modeling of wind turbine blades makes use of the Kirchhoff–Love thin shell theory discretized with isogeometric analysis (IGA). The coupled FSI formulation accommodates non-matching fluid-structure interface discretizations. The challenges of fluid–structural coupling and the handling of the computational mesh in the presence of large rotational motions is discussed, and the FSI computations of a 5 MW offshore baseline wind turbine are shown.
Finite Element Simulation of Wind Turbine Aerodynamics: Validation Study using NREL Phase VI Experiment
The aerodynamics simulations are performed using the ALE–VMS formulation augmented with weakly enforced essential boundary conditions. The rotor-only simulations are performed for a wide range of wind conditions and the computational results compare favorably with the experimental findings in all cases. The sliding interface method is adopted for the simulation of the full wind turbine configuration. The full-wind-turbine simulations capture the blade–tower interaction effect, and the results of these simulations are also in good agreement with the experimental data.
Left: The predicted low-speed shaft torque at different wind speed. The simulation results are compared with the NREL experimental data with good agreement. Right: The single-blade aerodynamic torque over a full revolution. The tower effect is clearly pronounced and the result is in very good agreement with the experimental data.