Al, have you considered a height of over 70m? Most turbines and farms near me have a tower height of 70-110m. And that's for HAWT turbines rated at 7m/s wind for 1.5MW. Even reviewing a few VAWT designs (mostly Savonius) show that at 5m/s a 4MW design barely makes 0.5MW.
I'm not detracting from making a savonius or darrius VAWT, but I feel you need to get sufficiently above the ground layer into a clean air stream. Even a building 1 mile away will affect the ground layer at your site.
I've a real neat book I picked up for an Alternative Energies class that emphasizes wind energy (something my state has lots of).
Wind Energy Explained
Theory, Design and Application.
It has more math about capturing wind energy than you would want to read or learn. BUT the few equations it does have are what the major wind turbine producers use for building and siting wind farms; in that it would be useful to read it and apply the data to your site and see what kind of turbine design and size would work, if any.
|