New Rotor Blade Profiles Performance Decay in Horizontal Axis Wind Turbines Operating in Aggressive Environment

Abstract

At the present time many wind power plants have been developed in mountainous areas, in off-shore sites also at high latitudes and however operating in harsch climate or aggressive environment conditions. In these conditions HAWT’s rotor blades may experiment erosion, corrosion, exfoliation and icing and these operative conditions may cause a remarkable aerodynamical performance decay resulting in a reduction in energy production due to a lower machines availability too. Traditional aerodynamic profiles, as NACA ones, can show high sensitivity to the surface damage or augmented roughness, while new airfoils as FFA-W1 series may be very useful in maintaining higher aerodynamical performance. In the present paper the aerodynamic performances of new and old airfoils have been analysed and compared on a water table test bench and wind tunnel one, at “La Sapienza” University of Rome in DIMA’s laboratory, in several operative conditions, and, particularly, effects due to icing, erosion and other ones as corrosion and fouling. The results have been compared with literature data to obtain useful indications in design of new rotor blades.