Chapter 66

Blade Optimization of a Small Vertical-­

Axis Wind Turbine Using the Response
Surface Method

Chul-Kyu Kim, Sajid Ali, Sang-Moon Lee, and Choon-Man Jang

66.1  Introduction

Recently, hybrid renewable energy systems (HRES) have emerged as an alternative

technology in order to overcome the disadvantages of traditional renewable energy
systems by integrating various energy sources to supply a stable and continuous
electricity supply, as shown Fig. 66.1 [1]. The main energy sources of such HRES
are wind and solar energy. The availability of wind energy greatly differs depending
on location, topography, altitude, and season. In the case of South Korea, most
regions have very low wind speeds, except for some eastern mountainous areas
(refer to Fig. 66.2). So, most sites in the country have favorable wind conditions for
small vertical-axis wind turbines, rather than large horizontal-axis wind turbines
[2]. The small vertical-axis wind turbine (VAWT) has been attracting attention as a
key component of hybrid renewable energy systems due to their many advantages,
such as the low cut-in wind speed, low cost, low noise output, and high site flexibil-
ity [3]. For these reasons, the research on small vertical wind turbines is
increasing.
Danao et al. [4, 5] performed an unsteady-state performance test to discover the
features of vertical-axis wind turbines, using both a numerical analysis and experi-
mental data. They conducted experimental study on a vertical-axis wind turbine of
a wind tunnel scale with unsteady wind conditions, in addition to performing a

C.-K. Kim · S.-M. Lee

Department of Land, Water and Environment Research, Korea Institute of Civil Engineering
and Building Technology, Goyang-si, Republic of Korea
S. Ali · C.-M. Jang (*)
Department of Land, Water and Environment Research, Korea Institute of Civil Engineering
and Building Technology, Goyang-si, Republic of Korea
Construction Environment Engineering, University of Science and Technology,
Goyang-si, Republic of Korea
e-mail: jangcm@kict.re.kr

© Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2020 801

A. Sayigh (ed.), Renewable Energy and Sustainable Buildings, Innovative
Renewable Energy, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-18488-9_66
802 C.-K. Kim et al.

Fig. 66.1  Concept of hybrid renewable energy system for an off-grid island [1]

Fig. 66.2  Mean wind

speed at 40 m above
ground level in South
Korea (Sajid et al., 2018)

numerical analysis using Reynolds-averaged Navier-Stokes (RANS) equations to

study the effects of steady and the unsteady states on the performance of
VAWT. Jaohindy et al. [6] reported the Unsteady Reynolds-averaged Navier-Stokes
(URANS) analysis to simulate the unsteady flow behavior of a Savonius rotor with
different aspect ratios. Bazilevs et  al. [7] reported that a continuously changing
angle of attack of wind on the wind turbine rotor drops its aerodynamic efficiency.
They performed important function of averaging of real-time data to evaluate the
performance of installed wind turbines. Jang et al. (2017) carried out analyzing the
effect of different time averaging steps using the real-time-measured wind data of
the test site. They also conducted numerical simulations using the URANS analysis
66  Blade Optimization of a Small Vertical-Axis Wind Turbine Using the Response… 803

and compared 10-, 20-, and 30-min averaged experimental data. In this study, they
showed that turbine performance analyzed by using 10-min time-averaged data is in
good agreement with the result of the numerical simulation. However, there are very
few studies concerning the optimization of the blade of small vertical-axis wind
turbines to improve the performance using the RSM as a designing tool.
The main focus of our work is to optimize the blade shape of an H-Darrieus rotor
of a small vertical-axis wind turbine to attain the maximum power coefficient using
the Response Surface Method for conditions with wind speeds under 4 m/s and TSR
2.6 conditions. A 1.5 kW vertical-axis wind turbine was installed on the Deokjeok-do
Island test bed in South Korea and was used as a reference model. The optimization
of the blade was the central goal of the Response Surface Method. The maximum
thickness location and the chord length were chosen as design variables for the
blade optimization in order to enhance the turbine power generation performance.
The objective function is the power coefficient, which is a dimensionless perfor-
mance factor that represents the ratio of turbine power as compared to the theoreti-
cal maximum power. The numerical analysis of the URANS was introduced in
order to obtain the power coefficient. Consequently, this work showed the optimum
model successfully improved the performance as compared to that of the reference
model.

66.2  Methodology

66.2.1  Vertical-Axis Wind Turbine and Geographical Location

In the present study, the wind turbine for optimization is a 1.5 kW vertical-axis wind
turbine of the H-Darrieus type installed on the Deokjeok-do Island test bed in South
Korea. Figure 66.3 shows the shape of the turbine rotor and its performance curve.
The design blade section profile is NACA0015, and the blade height and chord
length of the turbine rotor are 3 m and 0.2 m, respectively. The rotational diameter
of the turbine rotor is 2 m. The cut-in speed of the turbine is 3 m/s, whereas the rated
wind speed and rotational speed are 13.5 m/s and 300 rpm, respectively.
Figure 66.4 shows the turbine altitude and an overall view of the test bed. An
anemometer and anemoscope are installed at the height of 10 m above the ground.

Fig. 66.3  Shape of wind turbine rotor (left) and turbine performance curve (right)
804 C.-K. Kim et al.

Fig. 66.4  Altitude of the wind turbine (left) and an overall view of system (right)

66.2.2  Wind Environmental Assessment

Analyzing the wind characteristics of a particular site is of immense importance for

optimally designing a site-specific wind turbine. The Weibull probability density
function (PDF) and cumulative distribution function (CDF) are commonly used
tools for assessing the wind potential of a particular site. Many researchers have
recommended the use of Weibull functions as the standard tool for wind potential
assessment [8–10]. For the wind data analysis on Deokjeok-do Island, eleven years
(2005–2015) of measured wind data were utilized, which was recorded by Korean
Meteorological Association [11]. Figure 66.5 show the results of the wind data anal-
ysis in the forms of a Weibull PDF and CDF plots. As it is clear from Fig. 66.5 that
most frequently occurring wind speed is 4 m/s, so that will be used as the reference
wind speed for the numerical simulation process. Similarly, Fig. 66.5 also shows the
wind rose diagram on Deokjeok-do Island.
Tip speed ratio (TSR) is one of the important parameters for assessing the perfor-
mance of a wind turbine. The most frequently occurring TSRs and wind speeds will
be estimated at the test bed (using experimental data) and will be used as the operat-
ing conditions for numerical simulations. As mentioned above, finding out the most
probable TSR is of key importance for setting the appropriate value of the rotational
speed for numerical simulations. For this purpose, Fig.  66.6 has been prepared
showing the distribution of TSRs as a frequency percentage. From the results of
Fig. 66.6, it is apparent that the approximate value of the most frequent TSR is 2.6.

66.2.3  Numerical Method

In the numerical simulation, the incompressible three-dimensional unsteady RANS

equations were used to analyze the incompressible flow of the computational
domain as shown in Fig. 66.7. The grid system of the computational domain was
generated using 26 million elements, consisting of tetrahedral, hexahedral, and
66  Blade Optimization of a Small Vertical-Axis Wind Turbine Using the Response… 805

Fig. 66.5  Wind rose (left) and Weibull PDF curve (right) at the Deokjeok-do Island test bed

Fig. 66.6  Tip speed ratio (TSR) frequency at the Deokjeok-do Island test bed

prism meshes. The commercial code, SC/Tetra v13, has been employed in the pres-
ent numerical simulation. The boundary conditions at the inlet and outlet were given
to have a velocity of 4 m/s and the atmospheric pressure. The wall surface of the
computational the domain was given a slip wall condition allowing the consider-
ation of free flow, whereas the wall surface of the wind turbine was given a no-slip
condition. The shear stress transport (SST) model was employed as the turbulence
model [12] as it is well known to accurately predict the turbulence in most rotational
flows.

66.2.4  Optimization Method

The Response Surface Method (RSM) was used as the optimization method. The
RSM is one of the design of experiment (DOE) methods to optimize the response
(output variable), which is affected by several independent variables (input vari-
ables). The response surface designs are useful for modelling quadratic surfaces.
Designed response surface cases can identify points within a design area that have
806 C.-K. Kim et al.

Fig. 66.7  Computational domain (left) and grid system around the turbine rotor (right)

Table 66.1  Cases of response surface design

No. Max. thickness location, % Chord length, mm Remark
Case 1 20 100
Case 2 20 200
Case 3 40 200
Case 4 30 200 Reference model
Case 5 20 300
Case 6 40 100
Case 7 30 300
Case 8 30 100
Case 9 40 300

a minimum or maximum response. The optimum design points can also be esti-
mated within the design range through the response surface.
In the present study, the objective function of RSM is considered to be the power
coefficient, and the independent variables are considered to be the maximum thick-
ness location and the chord length of the blade. The maximum thickness location
can determine the optimal thickness position for the given wind speed condition,
and the chord length can determine the optimal length for the TSR condition.
According to the Sandia report [13], the maximum thickness location was reported
to increase the lift coefficient at a position of 22.9% greater than of a reference
model under low wind speed conditions. In the present study, the maximum thick-
ness locations were 20%, 30%, and 40%, and the chord lengths were 100  mm,
200 mm, and 300 mm. The blade section profiles were generated using QBlade [14],
an open source program distributed by the Berlin TU. The response surface designs
are also shown in Table 66.1 and a total of nine design cases were evaluated using
the statistical program, JMP 13 [15].
66  Blade Optimization of a Small Vertical-Axis Wind Turbine Using the Response… 807

66.3  Results and Discussion

66.3.1  Verification of Numerical Model

Figure 66.8 shows the results of the numerical model, as compared to the experi-
mental data. The numerical model was compared using the 10-min average wind
turbine power [3] with respect to wind speed conditions. The numerical simulation
and the experimental data show comparatively good agreement when comparing the
results. Therefore, the validated numerical model is applied to the numerical analy-
sis of the response surface design cases.

66.3.2  Determinant of Optimal Design Point Using RSM

Figure 66.9 shows the power coefficient with respect to design cases obtained by
numerical simulations. The values of the power coefficient for all nine cases gener-
ated by the response surface design were calculated by applying the same numerical
method and boundary conditions as the reference numerical model. Using the power
coefficient results for each case, a response surface can be created that has the qua-
dratic surface as shown in Fig. 66.10. Here, the optimal design point is the indepen-
dent variable value at the maximum point of the response surface. Therefore, the
optimal design point has a maximum thickness location of 24% and a chord length
of 210 mm, within the response surface of the design area.

Fig. 66.8 Verification
result of numerical model
808 C.-K. Kim et al.

Fig. 66.9  Power coefficient results of nine cases by response surface design

Fig. 66.10  Prediction fit curve of two independent variables (left) and response surface result
(right)

66.3.3  C
 omparison of the Reference Model and Optimum
Model

The optimum model was analyzed once again by using design variables determined
by the Response Surface Method. Figure 66.11 shows the results of comparing the
power coefficient according to the rotational angles of the reference model and the
optimum model. The minimum power coefficient of the optimum model increased
by 34.9% compared to that of the reference model, where the maximum power
coefficient increased by only 18.8%. Overall, the average power coefficient of the
reference model was 0.3063; however, the optimum model was 0.3453 which is an
improvement of approximately 12.7%. The vertical-axis wind turbine of the opti-
mum design point had a dramatic improvement under TSR 2.6 and 4  m/s wind
66  Blade Optimization of a Small Vertical-Axis Wind Turbine Using the Response… 809

Fig. 66.11  Positions of rotation angle at the min. Power coefficient (1970°) and the max. Power
coefficient (2040°)

speed conditions. In other words, the performance improvement of the optimum

model can be explained as the increase of the power coefficient by the loss reduction
of aerodynamic.
Figure 66.12 shows the velocity magnitude and vorticity around the blade at the
position of the minimum power coefficient. In the case of the optimum model, the
size of the vorticity flow induced by Blade 2 obstructing the wind flow was greatly
reduced compared to that of the reference model. Similarly, the velocity magnitude
contour of the optimum model shows a decrease of the vorticity area compared to
that of the reference model. Therefore, the power coefficient of the optimum model
increased due to the reduction of the turbine loss by a vorticity reduction.
Similarly, Fig.  66.13 shows the velocity magnitude and vorticity around the
blade at the position of the maximum power coefficient. For the optimum model,
the wake flow of Blade 1 is more stable than that of the reference model. On the
other hand, Blade 2 and Blade 3 of the reference and the optimum models show
similar flow patterns. In the comparison of the vorticity contours, the optimum
model showed a decrease of vorticity flow area around Blade 1 compared to that of
the reference model. Therefore, it can be seen that the optimum model has a reduced
loss due to the more stable wake flow.

66.4  Conclusions

Using a small vertical-axis wind turbine of the Darrieus-type installed on

Deokjeok-do Island in South Korea, turbine power performance has been enhanced
by the shape optimization of the turbine blade using the Response Surface Method.
The numerical model that analyzed the unsteady-state flow field has also been
810 C.-K. Kim et al.

(a) Velocity magnitude and streamlines

(b) Vorticity
Fig. 66.12  Comparison of velocity magnitude and vorticity at position of minimum power coef-
ficient. (a) Velocity magnitude and streamlines. (b) Vorticity

validated using the 10-min averaged power-speed experimental data and showed a
good agreement. The blade optimization under 4 m/s wind speed and TSR 2.6 con-
ditions has been performed to determine two independent variables of optimum
design by RSM that creates the response surface of the output variable. Consequently,
the present study can be summarized as follows:
• The maximum blade thickness (%) and chord length (mm) were shortlisted as
two independent design variables and considered three different values for each
variable. Therefore, a total nine design cases were analyzed at TSR 2.6, and the
optimum design point was found on the response surface to improve the perfor-
mance of small vertical-axis wind turbines.
• The optimum design point had the maximum thickness location of 24% and the
chord length of 210 mm as determined by the Response Surface Method. From
the simulation results and the Response Surface Method, it successfully improved
the power coefficient of wind turbine by 12.7% in comparison to that of the refer-
ence model.
66  Blade Optimization of a Small Vertical-Axis Wind Turbine Using the Response… 811

(a) Velocity magnitude and streamlines

(b) Vorticity
Fig. 66.13  Comparison of velocity magnitude and vorticity at position of maximum power coef-
ficient. (a) Velocity magnitude and streamlines. (b) Vorticity

• Through a comparison of both, i.e., the power coefficient curves and the flow
patterns, the increase of the power coefficient of the optimum model was consis-
tent with the decreasing tendency of vorticity flow and wake flow around the
blade. The optimum model has increased the power coefficient of the wind tur-
bine due to the reduction of turbine loss due to vorticity.

Acknowledgments  This work was supported by the New and Renewable Energy Core Technology
Program of the Korean Institute of Energy Technology Evaluation and Planning (KETEP) and
granted financial resources from the Ministry of Trade, Industry and Energy, Republic of Korea
(No. 20153010130310).

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