Open Question: wind turbine efficiency calculation?

30 July 2010, 10:05 pm

I have a question about the wind trubine efficiency. For a horizonal aix wind turbine system, the blades extract the wind energy, many websites say that the efficiency of a wind turbine can be up to 35%. To me, the blades can only extract the energy from wind which hits the blades at any moment of its rotation (no matter how slow or how fast), the wind flowing in between the blades does not contribute any energy, so the maximum energy can be extracted = (total blades area) / (the total sweep area), this assumes that such wind (hits the blades) gives up all its energy, it is not like this in real cases, In three blades system, the total blades area is less than 10% of their sweep area. so the efficiency is less than 10%. I am really comfused. Thank you for your help.... Read More »

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