Swept area
The Air Dolphin has a blade diameter of 1.80 metres. This means it has a swept area, or capture area of 2.54 square metres. This is all important when comparing wind turbines, since it directly relates to the amount of passing wind energy
the turbine blades can intercept.
Air Dolphin power output curve
The graph below shows the power produced (in watts) for the Air Dolphin at different wind speeds, based on
data supplied by the manufacturer.
The green line shows the actual output that the wind turbine achieves at the given wind speed,
according to the manufacturers.The dashed line in the graph shows the theoretical maximum energy that this turbine could extract from the wind,
according to Betz's Law (59.3%). At a typical wind speed of
5 m/s, the Air Dolphin is extracting
98.5 Watts of power from the wind, which is an efficiency of
50.35%.
How efficient is the Air Dolphin?
Wind turbines can only convert some of the energy in the wind into electricity. The graph here shows how efficient the
turbine is across the range of wind speeds you might get.
The orange line in the above graph shows the efficiency ranging from 0 to 1. The grey line is the previously mentioned maximum efficiency - The Betz Limit. If this limit is exceeded, the manufacturer's claims are not to be trusted!
While these graphs give an indication of the instantaneous power and efficiencies you might expect from the
Air Dolphin turbine, working out annual power production is more complex.
Read more about the
Power Predictor
The Air Dolphin features a stall mode, where the turbine is only semi-braked in high winds, allowing energy generation to continue where other turbines stop.
Semplice quote £6000-£7000 for a residential installation package.
Newly-designed low-noise blades.
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Can the turbine be connected with a standard AC converter normally used
to connect solar panels to the 220V network?
Thanks to reply in advance.
Regards,
Lieven