A floating river turbine extracts energy from the natural flow of a river without requiring a conventional dam. Its performance depends on how effectively the surrounding water is guided through the turbine and how much hydraulic energy can be converted into useful mechanical power.
FlowMotion used CFD to analyse the three-dimensional flow around and through the turbine system. The simulations provided the local velocity and pressure fields, the volumetric flow through the rotor and the hydrodynamic forces acting on the structure.
Geometry strongly influences both the acceleration of the water towards the rotor and the losses in the surrounding flow. Different configurations could therefore be compared using quantities such as torque, pressure difference and extracted power.
The CFD analysis made it possible to identify where hydraulic losses occurred and to optimise the geometry with the aim of increasing the energy-conversion efficiency of the complete system.
