Abstract
Small-scale wind turbines have market opportunities in distributed energy generation applications but face future challenges in remaining cost competitive compared with solar photovoltaic systems. High unit costs can be attributed to design conservatism when calculating fatigue loads of key structural components such as the blades. In this study, we use the aeroelastic software FAST to highlight limitations of the International Electrotechnical Commission 61400-2:2013 small wind turbine design standard for calculating fatigue life using the simplified load model. We present a modified method for calculating the fatigue spectra of small wind turbine blades. An advantage of this method is that it does not require complex aeroelastic simulations or field measurements. This modified method is intended to be implemented early in the blade design stage, such as during rotor optimization simulations, allowing for multiple rotor configurations to be rapidly compared.
| Original language | American English |
|---|---|
| Pages (from-to) | 549-557 |
| Number of pages | 9 |
| Journal | Wind Energy |
| Volume | 24 |
| Issue number | 6 |
| DOIs | |
| State | Published - 2021 |
Bibliographical note
Publisher Copyright:© 2020 The Authors. Wind Energy published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd
NREL Publication Number
- NREL/JA-5000-75971
Keywords
- aeroelastic modelling
- FAST
- IEC 61400-2:2013
- simplified load model