Wind Turbine Performance Under Icing Conditions
W. J. Jasinski, S. C. Noe, M. S. Selig, and M. B. Bragg
University of Illinois, Urbana, Illinois 61801
ABSTRACT
The effect of rime ice on horizontal axis wind turbine performance
were estimated. For typical supercooled fog conditions found in cold
northern regions, four rime ice accretions on the S809 wind turbine
airfoil were prediced using the NASA LEWICE code. The resulting
airfoil/ice profile combinations were wind tunnel tested to obtain the
lift, drag, and pitching moment characteristics over the Reynolds number
range 1 - 2 x 106. These data were used in the PROPID wind
turbine performance prediction code to predict the effects of rime ice on
a 450-kW rated-power, 28.7-m diameter turbine operated under both
stall-regulated and variable-speed/variable-pitch modes. Performance
losses on the order of 20 percent were observed for the
variable-speed/variable-pitch rotor. For the stall-regulated rotor,
however, a relatively small rime ice profile yielded significantly larger
performance losses. For a larger 0.08c-long rime ice protrusion, however,
the rated peak power was exceeded by 16 percent because at high angles the
rime ice shapes acted like a leading edge flap, thereby increasing the
airfoil Clmax and delaying stall.