WERTI - WIND ENERGY RECOVERY FROM TRANSPORT INFRASTRUCTURE

Group Project | 2019-2020

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Third Year Design Make and Test Project at Imperial College (MEng Mechanical Engineering)

(A grade)

A year-long Design Make and Test Project at Imperial College London.
The opportunity of harnessing energy from the wake of vehicles on the motorway using a Vertical Axis Wind Turbine (VAWT) was identified. Computational studies by others identified the Banki Wind Tunnel (a crossflow VAWT) as a promising design for this application due to the highly turbulent, vertical, and pulsing nature of the airflow. 
This project is the first experimental investigation into the performance of the Banki Wind Turbine at the motorway roadside. The project also aimed to experimentally verify the optimal flow entry angle. To carry this out, a small-scale Variable Geometry Banki VAWT was developed for testing in the wind tunnel. The variable geometry mechanism allows the flow entry angle to be easily adjusted in a lab. Dynamic similarity was used to recreate the airflow characteristic by the motorway roadside and ensure the performance of the small-scale VAWT in the lab was representative of full-scale performance. Initial testing suggests that the optimal flow entry angle lies in the vicinity of 16°.