Three green research projects from DTU Wind Energy receive a total amount of DKK 14 mio from The Independent Research Fund Denmark.
The Independent Research Fund Denmark has awarded DKK 333 million to 65 research projects in the field of green conversion. The funds are intended to ensure new original research breakthroughs in the fields of climate, nature, and the environment. The three projects from DTU Wind Energy that received their part of the research funds will work to strengthen research in the areas: weather models for offshore wind farms, sustainability in materials for e.g. wind turbines and the often very technical approach in the societal debate on the green transition towards renewable energy.
Julia Kirch Kirkegaard receives funding for the project ”Controversies in the green transition: The case of wind turbine sound and its politicisation (Co-Green)”
This project aims to further our understanding of how controversies over green transitions are exacerbated by a technical framing of the green transition and its solutions. Such disengagement of the green transition from politics through “technification” paradoxically leads to politicization and controversy. To examine this, we focus on wind power development, in particular how the matter of wind turbine sound becomes constituted as contestable ‘noise’. Informed by Science & Technology Studies, we explore the various existing forms of knowledge about wind turbine sound. Based on this, we examine how wind turbine sound is politicized in specific wind farm projects. This informs our experimentation with co-creation workshops, to explore how different forms of knowledge of sound can reach consensus. The project contributes to the field of Science Communication by coupling it with transition and social acceptance studies and to controversy studies by combining it with co-creation theory.
Alfredo Peña receives funding for the project “The project Multi-scale Atmospheric Modeling Above the Seas”
The project Multi-scale Atmospheric Modeling Above the Seas (MAMAS) investigates numerical methods to incorporate wave fields that vary both in time and space within a numerical weather prediction model. Since the sea state is difficult to represent in atmospheric models due to the multiscale, random, and spatio-temporal-varying nature of waves, we require that such a numerical prediction model has two special characteristics. First, the model should have so-called nesting capabilities, so that we are able to simulate a wide range of atmospheric motion scales. And, second, the model should have the ability to perform high-resolution modelling, e.g., through a large-eddy simulation capability which is a numerical simulation of flow in which part of turbulence is resolved and another part is modelled.
MAMAS aims at investigating the effects of wave fields on both the marine atmosphere at its different scales of motion and the performance of offshore wind farms. In MAMAS we want to evaluate the impact of the atmosphere, which is influenced by the sea waves, on both wind turbine and wind farm performance, and turbine wakes and their recovery. We also want to compare such impacts with results from an atmosphere-wave coupled modeling system.
Ali Sarhadi receives funding for the project “Thermo-mechanical model for 3D printing of sustainable thermoplastic composites (SustainPrint)”
In the industry non-recyclable so-called thermoset continuous fiber-reinforced composites (CFRCs) are used for manufacturing of materials that are used in wind energy, medical, aerospace, construction, etc. Today, the composites are usually not recyclable. In this project the researchers wish to make the CFRC’s sustainable, and in order to do so recyclable thermoplastic CFRC’s are used. In parallel with this development, the researchers are going to use 3D printing as this technology has emerged as one of the most promising techniques for fabrication of geometrically complex, sustainable composite structures. However, to fabricate high-quality structures with accurate geometrical dimensions and high mechanical performance the challenges associated with process-induced residual stress and distortion of the 3D printed structures must be overcome. This project aims to develop a physics-based thermo-mechanical model, validated by experiments, to predict the final geometry and residual stress state of a to-be-printed thermoplastic CFRC structure. The outcome of this project will facilitate the printing process optimization and transition to digital direct manufacturing, hence paving the way for the automated cost-efficient fabrication of high-performance and sustainable CFRCs.