Parametric analysis and optimization of a simple wind turbine in high speed railway tunnels

The harvesting of wind energy from the slipstream generated when a train passes through a tunnel is a new way to produce renewable energy. From the perspective of CFD (Computed fluid dynamics), a three-dimensional URANS (unsteady Reynolds-averaged Navier–Stokes) model was used to study the energy harvesting performance of wind turbines with different design parameters inside the tunnel during the entire process of a train passing through a tunnel. A higher value of offset distance of blades could promote the power efficiency of the wind turbine inside the wind tunnel. The maximum power efficiency with regard to overlap distance was found when an overlap distance is 0 m. The turbine with a negative twist angle yielded a better performance than the turbine with a positive twist angle. The optimal wind turbine can generate up to 157.9 W power when a train passes at 350 km/h. Given the tunnel distribution in China, 4.8 × 10¹² J energy will be recovered each day by this way, which is sufficient to supply the emergency power for railway lighting. It can also effectively ease the pressure of daily lighting power in railway tunnels.