NUMERICAL INVESTIGATION OF TWIN SAVONIUS ROTOR CONFIGURATION FOR TIDAL CURRENT ENERGY CONVERSION

Abstract

Indonesia is committed to achieving Net Zero Emissions by accelerating the transition toward renewable energy, including tidal current energy, which has significant potential in the Toyapekah Strait with current velocities ranging from 0.5 to 3.2 m/s. This study investigates the performance of a twin Savonius Vertical Axis Tidal Current Turbine (VATCT) in a Canard Layout enhanced with flow disturbances. Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) simulations were performed using a pressure-based transient solver with the SST k-ω turbulence model to evaluate three configurations: baseline, 0.7D, and 1D flow disturbances. Turbine performance was assessed using the coefficient of power (Cp) at various tip speed ratios (TSR). Results show that the 1D flow disturbance achieved the highest performance, producing a maximum Cp of 0.4685 at a flow velocity of 3.37 m/s and TSR of 0.8. Velocity and pressure analyses indicate that the 1D configuration enhances pressure differences and suppresses negative torque, improving energy extraction from low-velocity tidal currents.