Energy from the wind

ENERGY FROM THE WIND

Introduction

Windmills have been used for many centuries for pumping water and milling grain. The discovery of the internal combustion engine and the development of electrical grids caused many windmills to disappear in the early part of this century. However, in recent years there has been a revival of interest in wind energy and attempts are underway all over the world to introduce cost-effective wind energy conversion systems for this renewable and environmentally benign energy source.

In developing countries, wind power can play a useful role for water supply and irrigation (windpumps) and electrical generation (wind generators). These two variants of windmill technology are discussed in separate technical briefs. This brief gives a general overview of the resource and of the technology of extracting energy from the wind.

Please be aware that most of the text below is biased to small, uncontrolled windturbines. The modern, larger types for grid connected electricity generation, work with the same physical laws, but are electronically controlled to work at optimal operating paramters all the time.

Energy availability in the wind

The power in the wind is proportional to the cube of wind velocity. The general formula for wind power is:

[math]Power=\tfrac{1}{2}\times Density\ of\ air \times Swept\ area \times Velocity^3[/math]

or

[math]P=\tfrac{1}{2} \times\rho \times A \times v^3[/math]

If the velocity (v) is in m/s, then at sea level (where the density of air is 1.2 kg/m³) the power density of the wind is:

[math]Power\ Density\ (\tfrac{Watts}{m^2})=0.6 \times v^3\ [/math]

This means that the power density in the wind will range from 10W/m² at 2.5 m/s (a light breeze) to 41,000 W/m² at 40 m/s (a hurricane). This variability of the wind power resource strongly influences virtually all aspects of wind energy conversion systems design, construction, siting, use and economy.

For large, modern wind turbines this means that they have a cut-in wind speed of 2.5 to 4 m/s and are switched off only at the highest possible wind speeds. They are designed to reach the rated max power rating of the generator at a specific wind speed, often at 6 to 7 m/s. In times that there is more wind, the turbine controller changes the blade pitch to a less optimal angle, and thus controls the power output of the turbine at the max power rating of the generator.

Principles of wind energy conversion

There are two primary physical principles by which energy can be extracted from the wind; these are through the creation of either drag or lift force (or through a combination of the two). The difference between drag and lift is illustrated (see Figure 1) by the difference between using a spinaker sail, which fills like a parachute and pulls a sailing boat with the wind, and a bermuda rig, the familiar triangular sail which deflects with wind and allows a sailing boat to travel across the wind or slightly into the wind. Drag forces provide the most obvious means of propulsion, these being the forces felt by a person (or object) exposed to the wind. Lift forces are the most efficient means of propulsion but being more subtle than drag forces are not so well understood.

The basic features that characterise lift and drag are:

• drag is in the direction of airflow
• lift is perpendicular to the direction of airflow
• generation of lift always causes a certain amount of drag to be developed
• with a good aerofoil, the lift produced can be more than thirty times greater than the drag
• lift devices are generally more efficient than drag devices

Types and characteristics of wind harvesters

There are two main families of wind harvesters: vertical axis machines and horizontal axis machines. These can in turn use either lift or drag forces to harness the wind. Of these types the horizontal axis lift device represents the vast majority of successful wind machines, either ancient or modern. In fact other than a few experimental machines virtually all windmills come under this category.

There are several technical parameters that are used to characterize windmill rotors. The tip-speed ratio is defined as the ratio of the speed of the extremities of a wind harvester rotor to the speed of the free wind. It is a measure of the 'gearing ratio' of the rotor. Drag devices always have tip-speed ratios less than one and hence turn slowly, whereas lift devices can have high tip-speed ratios and hence turn quickly relative to the wind.

                  Blade tip speed 
Tip speed ratio = --------------- 
                    Wind speed

The proportion of the power in the wind that the rotor can extract is termed the coefficient of performance (or power coefficient or efficiency; symbol Cp) and its variation as a function of tip-speed ratio is commonly used to characterise different types of rotor. It is physically impossible to extract all the energy from the wind, without bringing the air behind the rotor to a standstill. Consequently there is a maximum value of Cp of 59.3% (known as the Betz limit), although in practice real wind rotors have maximum Cp values in the range of 25%-45%.

Solidity is usually defined as the percentage of the circumference of the rotor which contains material rather than air. High-solidity machines carry a lot of material and have coarse blade angles. They generate much higher starting torque than low-solidity machines but are inherently less efficient than low-solidity machines as shown in Figure 4. The extra materials also cost more money. However, low-solidity machines need to be made with more precision which leads to little difference in costs.

The choice of rotor is dictated largely by the characteristic of the load and hence of the end use. These aspects are discussed separately in the technical briefs on windpumps and windturbines. Table 1 compares different rotor types.

Financial cost of wind energy harvesting

Small residential wind power turbines can be an attractive alternative, or addition, to those people needing more than 100-200 watts of power for their home, business, or remote facility. Unlike PV's, which remain at basically a similar cost per watt independent of array size, wind generators get cheaper with increasing system size. At the 50 watt size level, for instance, a small residential power turbine would cost about $8.00/watt in comparison to approximately $6.00/watt for a Photovoltaic module.

This is why, all things being equal, photovoltaic systems are cheaper for very small loads. As the system size gets larger, however, this "rule-of-thumb" reverses itself.

At 300 watts the turbine costs are down to $2.50/watt, while the PV costs are still at $6.00/watt. For a 1,500 watt wind system the cost is down to $2.00/watt and at 10,000 watts the price of a wind generator (excluding electronics) is down to $1.50/watt.

References and further reading

• Windpumping, (Practical Action Technical Brief)
• Wind Power for Electricity Generation, Practical Action Technical Brief
• S. Dunnett: Small Wind Energy Systems for Battery Charging, Practical Action Technical Information Leaflet
• Hugh Piggott: It's A Breeze, A Guide to Choosing Windpower. Centre for Alternative Technology, 1998
• E. H. Lysen: Introduction to Wind Energy, basic and advanced introduction to wind energy with emphasis on water pumping windmills. SWD, Netherlands, 1982
• Jack Park: The Wind Power Book Cheshire Books, USA, 1981
• Hugh Piggot: Windpower Workshop, building your own wind turbine. Centre for Alternative Technology, 1997
• S. Lancashire, J. Kenna and P. Fraenkel: Windpumping Handbook I T Publications, London, 1987
• P. Fraenkel, R. Barlow, F. Crick, A. Derrick and V. Bokalders: Windpumps - A guide for development workers. ITDG Publishing, 1993
• David, A. Spera: Wind Turbine Technology, fundamental concepts of wind turbine engineering. ASME Press, 1994
• E. W. Golding: The Generation of Electricity by Wind Power Redwood Burn Limited, Trowbridge, 1976
• T. Anderson, A. Doig, D. Rees and S. Khennas: Rural Energy Services - A handbook for sustainable energy development. ITDG Publishing, 1999.

External links

• Wind energy calculation
• Wind Power Progress

See also

• Types of wind turbines
• Comparison of bladed rotors for WECS