Certificates of Advanced Studies

Fluid Mechanics of Wind Energy Systems

Profile

Studying the certificate 'Fluid Mechanics of Wind Energy Systems' will provide a profound knowledge of master level mathematics and fluid mechanics as well as computational methods used for the fluid mechanical analysis of wind energy converters for stationary and transient cases on an expert level. Furthermore, a strong knowledge about the aerodynamics of rotor blades will be facilitated. The goal of the certificate is not only to enable engineers to apply existing commercial software packages of computational fluid mechanics in a sophisticated manner as basis for reliable prognoses of the fluid flow around wind turbines, but also to improve the quality of numerical methods and to develop more realistic models of wind energy systems. These aspects are fundamental ingredients for the engineering optimization of state-of-the-art wind turbines and their future innovative designs with a higher energy efficiency, lifetime, degree of capacity utilization and robustness with regard to extreme load cases.

Qualification

The participants of the certificate program will learn a strong basis in mathematics, fundamental fluid mechanics and they will understand about classical, current and future numerical methods for the solution of fluid flow models of wind turbines. They will also be familiar with the aerodynamics of wind turbines and hydrodynamics for o shore systems. The advantages and disadvantages of models and numerical methods and they will recognize which combinations of models and numerical methods can be eciently and trustworthily applied for special kinds of computational fluid mechanics. Furthermore, the students will be familiar with the limitations of the models and numerical methods and they overcome these limitations by writing their own partial programs for special tasks in their professional career. Based on their capability to perform realistic simulations of fluid flow subjected to wind turbines, they will be engineers in charge of the design of current wind energy converters, new developments of detailed aspects and general novel designs of wind turbines.