4.6 Power from airfoils: the sail boat analogy [A good introduction to understanding the power extraction by means of airfoils ts to analyse the behaviour of a sail boat or sailing car. It te particularly useful to denonstrate the difference between drag-driven and lift-driven devices. The example 1s taken from Sérensen's opus “Renewable Energy” [17]- For our analysis we use the speeds and angles as illustrated in fig. 4.19. This figure 1s nearly identical to fig. 4-8, except that the wind direction now enters at an angle § with respect to the nornal of the plane in which the airfoil moves. Later on this angle will become the angle of yaw of a horizontal-axis wind rotor. Figs 4.19 Velocity components for an airfoil moving with a speed U in a windspeed V.75 ‘The power extracted by the airfoil from the wind is given by: PeFoU (4.16) with Fy being the force in the U-direction. This force is composed of contributions by the lift and the drag: FL Losin @ =D cos ¢ (4.17) where lift and drag are given by (see section 4-3) L = Ce b tw (4.18) Do= Geb ke we (4.19) chord of sail (blade) b: span of sail (blade) with The relative velocity W can be expressed in U and Vi wo =v? + v2 - 20 sin 6 (4.20) whereas ¢ and § are related as follows: v sin & W stag = E8225 ana cos ¢ When introduciag the speed ratio 1 = ¥ analoguous to the tip speed ratio A the expression for the power becomes: 2 pecbtovia{¥ (1+A2 722 sin 8)4(C, cos § - Ch(A-sin 8))} (4-21) Note that the power in the air for the area covered by the airfoil itself is given by ¢ b be V3.76 Now we can distinguish two cases: drag propulsion and lift propulsion. Drag propulsion occurs when the lift coefficient of the airfoil is assuned to be zero. We can see in expression (4.20) that in this case the highest power ts reached when sin 6 = 1 or 6 = 90°, f.e. when the ship is simply being pushed by the wind. The power 1s still a function of A: Peebt vex -) c) (1 - a) (4-22) of which a maximum is reached for 4 = (by taking dP/d\ = 0). The naxinun power found Le equal to: a 3 : Pax 737 Spe bY (4.23) 30%) of the power in the wind reaching the area of the sail. In the case of lift propulsion the situation is quite different. Now the highest value of the last term in (4.20) is attained for 6 = 0, de. when the wind direction.is perpendicular to the direction of movement of the sail boat. In this situation the power becomes: In other words, with the highest value of Cp = 2 for a half Peebto Vea (1+ A)A(C, - CA) (4-24) We can reasonably approach this, via ) v¥ (1 +2") =X (within 2% for 2 > 5) ee a2 (¢ zl Peebbpe via? (c- CA) (4.25) A maximum is reached for: « = (4.28) D7 The resulting maximum power becomes: )2 cc b ko v3 (4.27) We may conclude that even with simple airfoils, having C1/Cp * 10 and Cy, = 1, outputs can be reached that are about fifty times higher compared to the powers with drag propulsion. It is important to note that in this case the power is extracted from an area equal to about 400/27 = 15 times the actual blade area- This is exactly why two or three bladed wind rotors, with a relatively small blade area compared to their swept area (the so- called solidity ratio), still can extract power from the whole swept area. 4.7. Axial momentum theory The first description of the axial uonentun theory was given by Rankine in 1865 and was improved later by Froude. The theory provides a relation between the forces acting on a rotor and the resulting flutd velocities and predicts the ideal efficiency of the rotor. Later on Betz included rotational wake effects in the theory. Recently, Wilson, Lissanan and Walker have further analyzed the aerodynamic performance of wind turbines [s]- For our analysis we shall use the symbols as indicated in fig. 4.20 below. Note that for the undisturbed wind speed Vj (= Vg of chapter 2) we shall later on use the notation V-