The airfoil plays an important role in improving the performance of wind turbines. However, there is less research dedicated to the airfoils for Vertical Axis Wind Turbines (VAWTs) compared to the research on Horizontal Axis Wind Turbines (HAWTs). With the objective of maximizing the aerodynamic performance of the airfoil by optimizing its geometrical parameters and by considering the law of motion of VAWTs, a new airfoil, designated the LUT airfoil (Lanzhou University of Technology), was designed for lift-driven VAWTs by employing the sequential quadratic programming optimization method. Afterwards, the pressure on the surface of the airfoil and the flow velocity were measured in steady conditions by employing wind tunnel experiments and particle image velocimetry technology. Then, the distribution of the pressure coefficient and aerodynamic loads were analyzed for the LUT airfoil under free transition. The results show that the LUT airfoil has a moderate thickness (20.77%) and moderate camber (1.11%). Moreover, compared to the airfoils commonly used for VAWTs, the LUT airfoil, with a wide drag bucket and gentle stall performance, achieves a higher maximum lift coefficient and lift–drag ratios at the Reynolds numbers 3 × 10⁵ and 5 × 10⁵.

In order to design a high-performance rotor, a high-efficient optimization method is established by coupling Kriging model and sequential quadratic programming with high-accuracy computational fluid dynamics method. In order to obtain the global optimal design point, the initial blade shape is optimized by using the Kriging model coupled with genetic algorithm based on the baseline rotor blade (Helishape 7A rotor). After that, the modified sequential quadratic programming method is employed to search the final blade shape based on the initial blade shape deeply. In the optimal process, the regions of design variables are restricted considering rotor dynamic characteristics. As a result, a new shape of rotor blade with characters of nonlinear twist, variational chord length, complex swept, and anhedral distributions is obtained. Compared with the baseline rotor, blade-tip vortex of the final optimized rotor is significantly weakened, the figure of merit of the final optimized rotor increases about 3.42%, and the peak of sound pressure decreases about 16.9%. At the same time, it is demonstrated that the final optimized rotor has better forward flight characteristics.

To study the three-dimensional effects on the dynamic-stall characteristics of a rotor blade, the unsteady flowfields of the finite wing and rotor were simulated under dynamic-stall conditions, respectively. Unsteady Reynolds-averaged Navier–Stokes (URANS) equations coupled with a third-order Roe–MUSCL spatial discretization scheme were chosen as the governing equations to predict the three-dimensional flowfields. It is indicated from the simulated results of a finite wing that dynamic stall would be restricted near the wing tip due to the influence of the wing-tip vortex. By comparing the simulated results of the finite wing with the spanwise flow, it is indicated that the spanwise flow would arouse vortex accumulation. Consequently, the dynamic stall is restricted near the wing root and aggravated near the wing tip. By comparing the simulated results of a rotor in forward flight, it is indicated that the dynamic stall of the rotor would be inhibited due to the effects of the spanwise flow and Coriolis force. This work fills the gap regarding the insufficient three-dimensional dynamic stall of a helicopter rotor, and could be used to guide rotor airfoil shape design in the future.

A new wind turbine airfoil design method is established. This method generates an airfoil by fusing different airfoils. The airfoil designed by this method could restrict the airflow separation near the trailing edge of airfoil at high angle of attack, meanwhile the turbulence also is restricted. As a result, the maximum lift force is increased about 16.4% at high angle of attack. Meanwhile, the drag force is decreased about 31.3%. By analyzing the influence of scale factor and rotation angle on the airfoil aerodynamic force characteristics, the simulated results indicate that the larger scale factor and rotation angle could increase the lift stall angle and the maximum lift force. Therefore, this method could be used for designing wind turbine airfoil with high maximum lift force characteristics.

One of the important challenges for Vertical Axis Wind Turbine (VAWT) is to fully understand its dynamic characteristics in different operating conditions. Meanwhile, it is necessary to seek a fast and accurate method to evaluate the dynamic characteristic of VAWT. In this study, we improve the LB model by considering the operating principle of VAWT to study the dynamic characteristics of the dedicated and commonly used VAWT airfoils in different operating conditions. The results show that the improved LB model is suitable for simulating the dynamic characteristic of VAWT with a thick airfoil. Although the asymmetric airfoil shows the higher lift coefficient, their dynamic characteristic appears huge fluctuation as the increases of tip speed ratio. Moreover, at a low tip speed ratio, the advantages of the asymmetric airfoil are not obvious. While the dynamic characteristic of the symmetric airfoil is relatively stable with the variation of tip speed ratio.