CFD Letters 14, Issue 10 (2022) 87-98 87 CFD Letters Journal homepage: https://semarakilmu.com.my/journals/index.php/CFD_Letters/index ISSN: 2180-1363 The Aerodynamic Performance of the Small-Scale Wind Turbine Blade with NACA0012 Airfoil Siti Amni Husna Roslan 1 , Zainudin A. Rasid 1,* , Ahmad Kamal Arifin Mohd Ehsan 2 1 Department of Mechanical Precision Engineering, Malaysia-Japan International Institute of Technology, Universiti Teknologi Malaysia, 54100 Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia 2 Dept of Mechanical & Manufacturing Engineering, Faculty of Engineering and Built Environment, Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia, 43600 Bangi, Selangor, Malaysia ARTICLE INFO ABSTRACT Article history: Received 12 August 2022 Received in revised form 5 September 2022 Accepted 27 September 2022 Available online 31 October 2022 Small-scale wind turbine (SSWT) has been the subject of intensive research to complement its large-scale counterpart especially for usage in low wind speed regions. Two important issues that plague the development of the SSWT are its low in power coefficient especially due to the low Reynold’s number ( ) condition that it’s operating in and the start-up difficulty that it faces. In this paper, the blade element momentum theory (BEMT) has been used to analyse a small-scale wind turbine having 3 m diameter. The airfoil used is the NACA 0012. The simplified experimental based equations have been used to determine the coefficient of lift,   and coefficient of drag,   of the airfoil. A developed MATLAB’s code applying the basic BEMT method is used. The results of aerodynamic performances including power coefficient, power and thrust are given as a function of wind speed, tip speed ratio (TSR) and Reynold’s number. It shows that at the minimum wind speed of 3 m/s, the wind turbine can have power coefficient of 43% but to produce 600 W of power that is required for total needs of electrical consumption of a household, the wind speed needed is 5m/s which is reachable for low wind speed region. Keywords: small scale wind turbine; blade element momentum theory (BEMT); NACA0012; low Reynold’s number condition 1. Introduction The high usage of carbon-based energy sources such as oil, gas and coal has caused the release of greenhouse gases and the climate crisis [1-3]. Other than solar energy, wind energy has been the choice of many countries to replace the conventional energy sources due to its green and sustainable nature [4-6]. To produce the wind energy, SSWT is catching up its large-scale counterpart especially in low wind speed regions and remote and even urban areas [7]. Even though the design of the small- scale wind turbine uses the same tools as for the large-scale wind turbine, 3 important criteria that characterize the small-scale wind turbine are its low Reynold’s number (Re) condition, low start-up capabilities and low cost [8]. With low wind speed and small blade size, the wind flow operates at low Re that is dominated by drag, only to lower the wind turbine power coefficient, CP [9-11]. Again, * Corresponding author. E-mail address: arzainudin.kl@utm.my (Zainudin A. Rasid) https://doi.org/10.37934/cfdl.14.10.8798