Multidisciplinary design optimization for wind turbine airfoil

A framework for multidisciplinary optimization design is applied to solve the coupling problem of optimization and flow field analysis in automatic all. For the operating conditions of wind turbine airfoil, the NACA4412 is chosen as an initial airfoil and is optimized in flow field with low Reynolds numbers. There are four modules integrated into software including airfoil generation, mesh division, flow field analysis and optimization. In the third module, the Navier-Stokes(N-S) equation is used. The optimization method is a multi-island genetic algorithm. Results show that an optimized airfoil has a higher lift coefficient and a 15.9% higher lift-drag ratio. This method can be applied in multi-disciplinary accurate analysis and realize the optimization cycle automatically, which can be widely used in airfoil optimization design.