One way fluid structural interaction for greenvalve's rotor blades analysis

In a world where energy harvesting is becoming one of the challenges of tomorrow, the GreenValve, which is originally a control valve, relies on converting energy from fluid flowing through water utilities into a reusable mechanical energy. For the purpose of investigating a possible turbine geometry, numerical simulations had been carried out to evaluate characteristics of NACA0040 airfoil profile blades that compose the GreenValve's turbine, mainly in a confined environment, through a One Way FSI Analysis. Using ANSYS Fluent, with a Realizable $\kappa$-$\epsilon$ turbulence model, simulations have been performed to understand the fluid behavior, impacted by its surrounding environment, with a Reynolds number of 50 000. From these have been reached drag and lift coefficients, as well as the moment developed by the turbine, for several positions of the turbine's blades. 2D and 3D models have been performed to realize that these parameters do not depend on the dimension of the problem. After CFD simulations, the flow field solutions obtained have been transferred to the solids surfaces to calculate constraints and deformations on the thermoplastic turbine, for different valve apertures. It results that from these few investigated configurations, the field of constraints significantly increases when the valve is closing, up to a point where the turbine suffers from irreversible damages. Then, alternative turbine configurations, as well as different fluid velocity inlets and the determination of the maximum differential pressure achievable, have been explored, to reduce mechanical constraints and to lead to a more adequate geometry for the whole valve.