Simplification of Turbine Structure and Performance Improvement of Micro Cross-Flow Hydropower Turbine

마이크로 관류수차의 구조 간소화 및 성능향상

Recently, micro hydropower attracts attention because of its clean, renewable and abundant energy resources to develop. However, suitable turbine type is not normalized yet in the range of micro hydropower and it is necessary to study for the effective turbine type. Moreover, relatively high manufacturing cost by the complex structure of the turbine is the highest barrier for developing the micro hydropower turbine. Therefore, a cross-flow turbine is proposed for micro-hydropower in this study because of its simple structure and high possibility of applying to low head. The purpose of this study is to further simplify the turbine structure and improve the performance, A guide vane is removed and the runner chamber is made compact using a new air supply method. The results show that the efficiency of the turbine is improved in a wide operating range and the size of the turbine is remarkably reduced.