Technical Report -- Comparison of Direct Finite Element Simulation with Actuator Line Models and Vortex Models for Simulation of Turbulent Flow Past a Vertical Axis wind Turbine

TL;DR

This paper compares three simulation methods—finite element, actuator line, and vortex models—for turbulent flow past a vertical axis wind turbine, evaluating their accuracy against experimental data across various tip speed ratios.

Contribution

It introduces a comparative analysis of three different turbine simulation methodologies, highlighting their relative accuracy and computational approaches.

Findings

Finite Element Simulation closely matches experimental normal force data.

Actuator Line Method provides a good approximation with less computational cost.

Vortex Model offers a simplified representation with reasonable accuracy.

Abstract

We compare three different methodologies for simulation of turbulent flow past a vertical axis wind turbine: (i) full resolution of the turbine blades in a Direct Finite Element Simulation (DFS), (ii) implicit representation of the turbine blades in a 3D Actuator Line Method (ALM), and (iii) implicit representation of the turbine blades as sources in a Vortex Model (VM). The integrated normal force on one blade is computed for a range of azimuthal angles, and is compared to experimental data for the different tip speed ratios, 2.55, 3.44 and 4.09.