2012年全球小型风电装机容量增长19%

3月20日，世界风能协会发布《2014年全球小型风电装机报告》。报告显示到2012年底，全球小型风电装机容量已经超过687MW，相比较2011年的576MW，增长了19％。其中，中国装机容量在全球总量中占到39％．美国和英国分别占比31％和9．4％。

Bearing Capacity and Technical Advantages of Composite Bucket Foundation of Offshore Wind Turbines

Based on mechanical characteristics such as large vertical load, large horizontal load, large bending moment and complex geological conditions, a large scale composite bucket foundation （CBF） is put forward. Both the theoretical analysis and numerical simulation are employed to study the bearing capacity of CBF and the relationship between loads and ground deformation. Furthermore, monopile, high-rise pile cap, tripod and CBF designs are compared to analyze the bearing capacity and ground deformation, with a 3-MW wind generator as an example. The resuits indicate that CBF can effectively bear horizontal load and large bending moment resulting from upper structures and environmental load.

Numerical Investigations on the Aerodynamic Performance of Wind Turbine： Downwind Versus Upwind Configuration

Although the upwind configuration is more popular in the field of wind energy, the downwind one is a promising type for the offshore wind energy due to its special advantages. Different configurations have different aerodynamic performance and it is important to predict the performance of both downwind and upwind configurations accurately for designing and developing more reliable wind turbines. In this paper, a numerical investigation on the aerodynamic performance of National Renewable Energy Laboratory （NREL） phase V1 wind turbine in downwind and upwind configurations is presented. The open source toolbox OpenFOAM coupled with arbitrary mesh interface （AMI） method is applied to tackle rotating problems of wind turbines. Two 3D numerical models of NREL phase VI wind turbine with downwind and upwind configurations under four typical working conditions of incoming wind velocities are set up for the study of different unsteady characteristics of the downwind and upwind configurations, respectively. Numerical results of wake vortex structure, time histories of thrust, pressure distribution on the blade and limiting streamlines which can be used to identify points of separation in a 3D flow are presented. It can be concluded that thrust reduction due to blade-tower interaction is small for upwind wind turbines but relatively large for downwind wind turbines and attention should be paid to the vibration at a certain frequency induced by the cyclic reduction for both configurations. The results and conclusions are helpful to analyze the different aerodynamic performance of wind turbines between downwind and upwind configurations, providing useful references for practical design of wind turbine.

Design of Large-Scale Prestressing Bucket Foundation for Offshore Wind Turbines

The key in the force transmission between the tower and the foundation for offshore wind turbines is to transfer the large moment and horizontal loads. The finite element model of a large-scale prestressing bucket founda- tion for offshore wind turbines is set up and the structural characteristics of the arc transition structure of the founda- tion are analyzed for 40-60 channels(20-30 rows) arranged with prestressing steel strand under the same ultimate load and boundary conditions. The mechanical characteristics of the key parts of the foundation structures are illus- trated by the peak of the principal tensile stress, the peak of the principal compressive stress and the distribution areas where the principal tensile stress is larger than 2.00 MPa. It can be concluded that the maximum principal tensile stress of the arc transition decreases with the increasing number of channels, and the amplitude does not change signifi- cantly; the maximum principal compressive stress increases with the increasing number of channels and the amplitude changes significantly; however, for the distribution areas where the principal tensile stress is larger than 2.00 MPa, with different channel numbers, the phenomenon is not obvious. Furthermore, the principal tensile stress at the top of the foundation beams fluctuantly increases with the increasing number of channels and for the top cover of the bucket, the principal tensile stress decreases with the increasing number of channels.

Motion Performance and Mooring System of a Floating Offshore Wind Turbine

The development of offshore wind farms was originally carried out in shallow water areas with fixed （seabed mounted） structures. However, countries with limited shallow water areas require innovative floating platforms to deploy wind turbines offshore in order to harness wind energy to generate electricity in deep seas. The performances of motion and mooring system dynamics are vital to designing a cost effective and durable floating platform. This paper describes a numerical model to simulate dynamic behavior of a new semi-submersible type floating offshore wind turbine （FOWT） system. The wind turbine was modeled as a wind block with a certain thrust coefficient, and the hydrodynamics and mooting system dynamics of the platform were calculated by SESAM soRware. The effect of change in environmental conditions on the dynamic response of the system under wave and wind loading was examined. The results indicate that the semi-submersible concept has excellent performance and SESAM could be an effective tool for floating wind turbine design and analysis.

Dynamic Simulation on Collision Between Ship and Offshore Wind Turbine

By using ABAQUS/Explicit, the dynamic process of an offshore wind turbine(OWT) stricken by a ship of 5000DWT in the front direction is simulated. The OWT is located on a large-scale prestressing bucket foundation constructed by an integrated installation technique. According to the simulation results, under the ship collision, a certain range of plastic zone appears within a local area of arc transition structure of the bucket foundation, and the concrete plastic zone is seriously damaged. As the stress level of OWT tower is relatively low, the OWT tower is less affected. A great inertial force is generated at the top of the OWT tower as the mass of nacelle and blades is up to 400 t. The displacement of the tower is in the opposite direction of the ship collision at the end of 1 s under the action of inertial force. There is only a minor damage in the ship bow. Most of the kinetic energy is transformed into the plastic dissipation and absorbed by the arc transition structure of bucket foundation.

Investigation on Installation of Offshore Wind Turbines

Wind power has made rapid progress and should gain significance as an energy resource,given growing interest in renewable energy and clean energy.Offshore wind energy resources have attracted significant attention,as,compared with land-based wind energy resources,offshore wind energy resources are more promising candidates for development.Sea winds are generally stronger and more reliable and with improvements in technology,the sea has become a hot spot for new designs and installation methods for wind turbines.In the present paper,based on experience building offshore wind farms,recommended foundation styles have been examined.Furthermore,wave effects have been investigated.The split installation and overall installation have been illustrated.Methods appropriate when installing a small number of turbines as well as those useful when installing large numbers of turbines were analyzed.This investigation of installation methods for wind turbines should provide practical technical guidance for their installation.

Impeller modeling and analysis based on UG NX/KF and Fluent

Parametric modeling of the impeller which drove a small wind device was built by knowledge fusion technology.NACA2410 airfoil blade was created by KF language.Using technology of UG/KF secondary development for the automatic modeling of wind turbine blade,the program can read in the airfoil data files automatically and the impeller model entity can be generated automatically.In order to modify the model,the aerodynamic characteristics of the impeller were analyzed for getting aerodynamic parameters by Fluent.The maximum force torch and best parameters of impeller were calculated.A physical prototype impeller was manufactured and the correctness of the design was verified,and the error of force torch between simulation and experimental results is about 10%.Parameterization design of the impeller model greatly improves the efficiency of modeling and flexibility of the CAD system.

Functional design of wind turbine airfoils based on roughness sensitivity characteristics

To improve aerodynamic performance of wind turbine airfoils,the shape profile characteristic of the airfoil is investigated.Application of conformal transformation,one functional and integrated expression of wind turbine airfoils is presented.Using the boundary layer theory,the aerodynamic model with roughness of wind turbine airfoils is introduced by studying flow separation around the airfoil.Based on the shape expression and aerodynamic performance of airfoils,the function design of wind turbine airfoils is carried out that the maximum lift-drag ratio and low roughness sensitivity are designed objects.Three wind turbines airfoils with different thickness are gained which are used at tip part of blades.As an example,the aerodynamic performance of one designed airfoil with relative thickness of 15%is simulated in different conditions of clean surface,rough surface,laminar flow and turbulent flow.The comparison of aerodynamic performance between the designed airfoil and one popular NACA airfoil is completed which can verify the better performance of the designed airfoil and reliability of the designed method.

Dynamic Characteristics Analysis of the Offshore Wind Turbine Blades

The topic of offshore wind energy is attracting more and more attention as the energy crisis heightens.The blades are the key components of offshore wind turbines,and their dynamic characteristics directly determine the effectiveness of offshore wind turbines.With different rotating speeds and blade length,the rotating blades generate various centrifugal stiffening effects.To directly analyze the centrifugal stiffening effect of blades,the Rayleigh energy method (REM) was used to derive the natural frequency equation of the blade,including the centrifugal stiffening effect and the axial force calculation formula.The axial force planes and the first to third order natural frequency planes which vary with the rotating speed and length were calculated in three-dimensional coordinates.The centrifugal stiffening coefficient was introduced to quantitatively study the relationship between the centrifugal stiffening degree and the rotating speed,and then the fundamental frequency correction formula was built based on the rotating speed and the blade length.The analysis results show that the calculation results of the fundamental frequency correction formula agree with the theoretical calculation results.The error of calculation results between them is less than 0.5%.

Parametric geometry representations for wind turbine blade shapes

Based on the Joukowsky transformation and Theodorsen method, a novel parametric function （shape function） for wind turbine airfoils has been developed. The airfoil design space and shape control equations also have been studied. Results of the analysis of a typical wind turbine airfoil are shown to illustrate the evaluation process and to demonstrate the rate of convergence of the geometric characteristics. The coordinates and aerodynamic performance of approximate airfoils is rapidly close to the baseline airfoil corresponding to increasing orders of polynomial. Comparison of the RFOIL prediction and experimental results for the baseline airfoil generally show good agreement. A universal method for three-dimensional blade integration-＂ Shape function/Distribution function＂ is presented. By changing the parameters of shape function and distribution functions, a three dimensional blade can be designed and then transformed into the physical space in which the actual geometry is defined. Application of this method to a wind turbine blade is presented and the differences of power performance between the represented blade and original one are less than 0. 5%. This method is particularly simple and convenient for bodies of streamline forms.

Effect of wind fluctuating on self-starting aerodynamics characteristics of VAWT

The present work deals with an investigation of the self-starting aerodynamic characteristics of VAWT under fluctuating wind. In contrast to the previous studies, the rotational speed of the turbine is not fixed, the rotation of the turbine is determined by the dynamic interaction between the fluctuating wind and turbine. A weak coupling method is developed to simulate the dynamic interaction between the fluctuating wind and passive rotation turbine, and the results show that if the fluctuating wind with appropriate fluctuation amplitude and frequency, the self-starting aerodynamic characteristics of VAWT will be enhanced. It is also found that compared with the fluctuation amplitude, the fluctuation frequency of the variation in wind velocity is shown to have a minor effect on the performance of the turbine. The analysis will provide straightforward physical insight into the self-starting aerodynamic characteristics of VAWT under fluctuating wind.

Dynamic modeling and direct power control of wind turbine driven DFIG under unbalanced network voltage conditions

This paper proposes an analysis and a direct power control (DPC) design of a wind turbine driven doubly-fed induction generator (DFIG) under unbalanced network voltage conditions. A DFIG model described in the positive and negative synchronous reference frames is presented. Variations of the stator output active and reactive powers are fully deduced in the presence of negative sequence supply voltage and rotor flux. An enhanced DPC scheme is proposed to eliminate stator active power oscillation during network unbalance. The proposed control scheme removes rotor current regulators and the decomposition processing of positive and negative sequence rotor currents. Simulation results using PSCAD/EMTDC are presented on a 2-MW DFIG wind power generation system to validate the feasibility of the proposed control scheme under balanced and unbalanced network conditions.

Effect of blade pitch angle on aerodynamic performance of straight-bladed vertical axis wind turbine

Wind energy is one of the most promising renewable energy sources, straight-bladed vertical axis wind turbine(S-VAWT) appears to be particularly promising for the shortage of fossil fuel reserves owing to its distinct advantages, but suffers from poor self-starting and low power coefficient. Variable-pitch method was recognized as an attractive solution to performance improvement, thus majority efforts had been devoted into blade pitch angle effect on aerodynamic performance. Taken into account the local flow field of S-VAWT, mathematical model was built to analyze the relationship between power outputs and pitch angle. Numerical simulations on static and dynamic performances of blade were carried out and optimized pitch angle along the rotor were presented. Comparative analyses of fixed pitch and variable-pitch S-VAWT were conducted, and a considerable improvement of the performance was obtained by the optimized blade pitch angle, in particular, a relative increase of the power coefficient by more than 19.3%. It is further demonstrated that the self-starting is greatly improved with the optimized blade pitch angle.

Comparative Performance of Fixed-Speed and Variable-Speed Wind Turbine Generator Systems

In the early development of the wind energy, the majority of the wind turbines have been operated at constant speed. Subsequently, the number of variable-speed wind turbines installed in wind farms has increased. In this paper, a comparative performance of fixed and variable speed wind generators with Pitch angle control has been presented. The first is based on a squirrel cage Induction Generator （IG） of 315 kW rated power, connected directly to the grid. The second incorporated a Permanent Magnet Synchronous Generator （PMSG） of 750 kW rated power. The performances of each studied wind generator are evaluated by simulation works and variable speed operation is highlighted as preferred mode of operation.

Test on Muddy Soil Reinforcement by Negative Pressure and Electro-Osmosis Inside Cover-Bearing-Type Bucket Foundation for Offshore Wind Turbines

Cover-bearing-type bucket foundation for offshore wind turbines has been paid more and more attention due to its low cost and great bearing capacity. In order to ensure the cover-bearing mode, the muddy soil inside the bucket foundation should be reinforced by some soil consolidation methods, such as negative pressure and electro-osmosis. Firstly, tests were conducted to obtain the reasonable current density. Meanwhile, to improve the electro-osmotic speed and effectiveness, other factors such as intermittent power and layout of electrode, were also studied in the tests. Then, the soil reinforcing tests by negative pressure combined with electro-osmosis were performed for the muddy soil consolidation inside the bucket foundation. The results showed that soil reinforcement by negative pressure was quicker and more obvious during the early phase, and electro-osmotic method can affect more range of soil by rational arrangement of electrodes. Compared with negative pressure, the electro-osmotic method was a continuous and relatively slow process of reinforcement, which was complementary to the negative pressure method. The voltage value of electro-osmosis had little effect on the muddy soil reinforcement inside the bucket foundation, and 1.5 A was chosen as the most reasonable current value for scale model testing in the electro-osmotic method.

Seismic Design of Offshore Wind Turbine Withstands Great East Japan Earthquake and Tsunami

Japan＇s first open sea offshore wind farm, Kamisu offshore windfarm Phase l, was stricken by an earthquake of intensity 6 on the Japanese seismic scale and a five-meter-high tsunami during the Great East Japan Earthquake on March 11,2011. The wind farm resumed operation on March 14 after checks revealed no damage to the system, even though the wind farm was temporarily forced to stop due to the grid failure caused by the earthquake. Wind turbines require a precise seismic design especially in an earthquake-prone country such as Japan. Wind power Kamisu Phase 2 was built one year after the earthquake based on the experience of Kamisu Phase 1. This paper presents the seismic design of offshore wind turbines and the situation during the earthquake and tsunami.

Counter-Rotating Type Tidal Stream Power Unit Mounted on a Mono-pile

The authors have invented a unique counter-rotating type tidal stream power unit, which is composed of tandem propellers and a double rotational armature type generator without a stator. The front and the rear propellers drive, as for an upstream type, the inner and the outer rotational armatures in the counter-rotating directions respectively, which keep the rotational torques counter-balanced between both propellers and armatures. This paper investigates experimentally the output and forces acting on a pile in a water channel, to get design materials of the mono-pile type tidal stream power unit. The output is maximal at the moderate rotational speed, as the same as a wind turbine. The force acting on the pile is affected by the drag, the Karman vortex and the dynamic balances of the tandem propellers, and has dominant frequencies due to not only the individual but also the interacting rotation of the front and the rear propellers.

Wind Turbine Selection Criteria： A Customer Perspective

Selection of the wind turbine manufacturer is naturally an important issue for wind energy companies when they build new wind farms. This paper describes the main factors by which wind energy companies choose their turbine manufacturers in a selected case region in Finland. The study was conducted using semi-structured interviews, for which the experts and decision makers of selected wind energy companies formed the focus group. During the analysis of the results, it became clear that it was not possible to form a detailed and prioritized list of selection criteria, but still some general themes emerged. The main theme was the manufacturer and product reliability, and then the production volume, cost factors, availability factors, and the organization of maintenance in this order. Interestingly, the arctic conditions of the selected case region did not play any significant role.