The project
As our society becomes ever-more dependent on wind power, it is increasingly important to gain a deeper understanding and more accurate predictability of the wind power availability, the aero-elastic fatigue loads on the wind turbine blades/drive train, and the associated issues of turbine control. The Sandia method proposes to numerically simulate the instantaneous three-dimensional wind field impacting on a wind turbine based solely on information from the frequency spectrum of the incoming wind (i.e. PSD) and its two-point velocity correlations in space across the turbine diameter. This method of prediction is very appealing for industrial applications as numerical predictions agree well with field measurements. This project will investigate whether the Sandia method can reliably be applied to flow with different stability properties, and thereby allow both better initial turbine design and better live prediction of loads and fatigue in service.
Dr Marco Placidi - Principal Investigator
Dr Marco Placidi is a Lecturer in Experimental Fluid Mechanics in Faculty of Engineering and Physical Sciences, Department of Mechanical Engineering Sciences, Centre for Aerodynamics and Environmental Flow at the University of Surrey. Dr Placidi obtained both a BEng. in Aerospace Engineering and a MEng. in Aeronautics Engineering from La Sapienza - University of Rome (Italy). He obtained his Ph.D. in Engineering Sciences from the University of Southampton (UK) in 2015 for his work on wall-bounded turbulence in urban environments. He then joined City, University of London, where he worked as a Research Fellow on a series of projects in close collaboration with the aeronautical industry (e.g. Airbus, Airbus CR&T, Airbus Defence and Space, ESDU). At City, the work was predominantly in the field of flow instability and laminar/turbulent transition.
