American Journal of Modern Energy 2017; 3(2): 23-37 http://www.sciencepublishinggroup.com/j/ajme doi: 10.11648/j.ajme.20170302.12 Aerodynamic Design and Blade Angle Analysis of a Small Horizontal–Axis Wind Turbine Mohamed Khaled 1 , Mostafa Mohamed Ibrahim 2 , Hesham ElSayed Abdel Hamed 2 , Ahmed Farouk Abdel Gawad 3 1 Demonstrator in the Higher Institute of Engineering at El Sherouk City, Cairo, Egypt 2 Mechanical Power Engineering Department, Faculty of Engineering, Zagazig University, Zagazig, Egypt 3 Faculty of Engineering, Zagazig University, Zagazig, Egypt Email address: dr_mostafa48@yahoo.com (M. M. Ibrahim) To cite this article: Mohamed Khaled, Mostafa Mohamed Ibrahim, Hesham ElSayed Abdel Hamed, Ahmed Farouk Abdel Gawad. Aerodynamic Design and Blade Angle Analysis of a Small Horizontal–Axis Wind Turbine. American Journal of Modern Energy. Vol. 3, No. 2, 2017, pp. 23-37. doi: 10.11648/j.ajme.20170302.12 Received: May 9, 2017; Accepted: May 25, 2017; Published: June 30, 2017 Abstract: The wind turbine blades are the main part of the rotor. Extraction of energy from wind depends on the design of the blade. In this paper, a design method based on Blade Element Momentum (BEM) theory is explained for small horizontal– axis wind turbine model (HAWT) blades. The method was used to optimize the chord and twist distributions of the wind turbine blades to enhance the aerodynamic performance of the wind turbine and consequently, increasing the generated power. A Fortran program was developed to use (BEM) in designing a model of Horizontal–Axis Wind Turbine (HAWT). NACA 4412 airfoil was selected for the design of the wind turbine blade. Computational fluid dynamics (CFD) analysis of HAWT blade cross section was carried out at various blade angles with the help of ANSYS Fluent. Present results are compared with other published results. Power generated from wind turbine increases with increasing blade angle due to the increase in air– velocity impact on the wind turbine blade. For blade angle change from 20° to 60°, the turbine power from wind has a small change and reaches the maximum when the blade angle equals to 90°. Thus, HAWT power depends on the blade profile and its orientation. Keywords: Renewable Energy, HAWT Design, Blade Element Momentum Theory, Airfoil Aerodynamic, Blade Angle 1. Introduction A wind turbine is a generic term for machines with rotating blades that convert the kinetic energy of wind into useful power. The basic idea has been around for a long time but modern wind turbines are a far from the original designs. Modern turbines evolved from the early designs and are typically classified as one or more blades. Most of the turbines used today have three blades. The rotational speed is a very important design factor. Turbines operating at a constant rotor speed have been fomenting up to now, but turbines with variable rotational speed are becoming increasingly more common with the desire to optimize the captured energy, lower stress, and obtain better power quality. There are many different wind turbine classes, but two stands out as the best known: the vertical– axis turbine (VAWT), and the horizontal–axis turbine (HAWT) [1]. The objectives of this study are: (i) using BEM theory for aerodynamic design of the HAWT blades and performance analysis of the existing blades, (ii) building a computer program using this method to design a small HAWT rotor, (iii) studying the effect of blade angle on the turbine output power. 2. Literature Review Kulunk and Yilmaz [11] explained a design method based on blade element momentum (BEM) theory for horizontal– axis wind turbine (HAWT) blades. The method was used to optimize the chord and twist distributions of the blades. They applied their method to generate a 100kW HAWT rotor. Their computer program estimated the aerodynamic performance of some existing HAWT blades. Tenguria et al. [16] designed a horizontal–axis wind turbine blade with the help of Glauert's optimal rotor theory