!

15th Australasian
Wind Engineering
Society Workshop

23-24 February 2012 - Sydney Australia

the University of Sydney

Workshop Proceedings

Workshop Program and Table of Contents

Wednesday 22nd February 2012
1830 - 2030

Welcome Drinks - New Law Building Annexe

Day 1
0830 0845

Thursday 23rd February 2012

0845 0900

Intro & Housekeeping

0900 - 1030

Session 1 Urban and building physics

0900 1000

Chair: Dr Steve Cochard

Keynote 1 - Urban Physics: effects of wind on comfort, energy, health and driving rain
J. Carmeliet

Registration

1000 1015

Analysis of evaporative cooling in street canyons

S. Saneinejad, S. Defraeye, B. Blocken, P. Moonen, D. Derome and J. Carmeliet

1015 - 1030

Air Ventilation Assessment (AVA) for Building Development

K. Kwok, K. Tse, C. Tsang and K. Wong

13

1030 1100

Morning Tea

1100 - 1230

Session 2 Wind energy and flow over topography

1100 - 1115

Chair: Professor Kenny Kwok

Vortex formation above prismatic-shaped cliffs; an experimental and numerical
investigation
S. Cochard, A. Montlaur, D. Fletcher, C. Letchford and T. Earl

17

1115 - 1130

Study of wind speeds over hilly terrain using full-scale observations, wind tunnel simulation
and CFD
P. Carpenter, P. Cenek, M. Revell, R. Turner, R. Flay and A. King

21

1130 - 1145

Wind and wind hazard related research at NIWA

S. Moore, R. Turner, M. Revell, S. Reese and S. Webster

25

1145 - 1200

The effect of turbulence on near wake structure of a horizontal axis wind turbine wake
M. Sherry, J. Sheridan and D. Jacono

29

1200 - 1215

Improved characterisation of wind shear for determination of fatigue loading on wind

turbines
K. Swalwell

33

1215 - 1230

A numerical study of the updrafts over a building, with comparison to wind tunnel results
A. Mohamed, C. White and S. Watkins

37

1230 - 1330

Lunch

1330 - 1500

Session 3 Measurement of wind forces and wind tunnel design

1330 - 1345

Chair: A/Professor John Ginger

Drag coefficients for roughened circular cylinders in super-critical flow
J. Holmes, D. Burton and H. Fricke

41

1345 - 1400

Characteristic wind pressures on net protection canopies

E. Osborn

45

1400 - 1415

Discharge coefficients for a dominant opening in a building

P. Kim and J. Ginger

49

1415 - 1430

Full-scale measurement of sail shapes and pressures

D. Morris, D. Le Pelley and P. Richards

53

1430 - 1445

Wind loads on solar panels in dual-layer offset-plate arrangements

R. Edgar, S. Cochard and Z. Stachurski

57

1445 - 1500

CFD simulations of the new University of Sydney boundary layer closed circuit Wind tunnel
A. Bertholds, S. Cochard and D. Fletcher

61

1500 - 1530

Afternoon Tea

1530 - 1645

Session 4 Occupant/pedestrian comfort and fire

1530 - 1545

Chair: Dr Graeme Wood

A comparison of pedestrian wind comfort and safety criteria
H. Fricke and J. Holmes

65

1545 - 1600

Survey of occupant response in wind-excited tall buildings

K. Selvakumar, K. Kwok and S. Lamb

69

1600 - 1615

Experience with wind-induced building motion in Wellington, New Zealand: Motion

sickness, compensatory behaviours and work location preference
S. Lamb, K. Kwok and D. Walton

73

1615 - 1630

A dual-axis tall building motion simulator to investigate effects of wind-induced building

motion on human
K. Kwok and K. Wong

77

1630 - 1645

The application of CFD to modelling of ember attack on housing during bushfires

M. Leahy, K. Liow and D. Collins

81

1645 - 1700

Break

1700 - 1745

AWES Annual General Meeting

1830 - 2230

Workshop dinner - The Botanical Gardens Restaurant

Day 2

Friday 24th February 2012

0830 0845

Housekeeping

0845 1030

Session 5 Wind monitoring and analysis

Chair: Dr David Henderson

0845 - 0945

Keynote 2 - Innovative technologies to investigate fine-scale wind flow

J. Schroeder

85

0945 1000

Estimates of extreme gust wind speeds from failed road-signs

J. Ginger, J. Holmes, C. Leitch and D. Henderson

93

1000 1015

Statistical comparison of coincident wind gust measurements from Dines and cup
anemometers
R. Cechet and L. Sanabria

97

1015 - 1030

Calculation of wind direction multipliers using climate simulated data

L. Sanabria and R. Cechet

101

1030 1100

Morning Tea

1100 - 1230

Session 6 Tropical Cyclone Yasi: One year on

1100 - 1115

Chair: Dr Matthew Mason

Meteorological Aspects of Cyclone YASI with a focus on the Landfall Phase
A. Auden and J. Davidson

105

1115 - 1130

Cyclone Yasi windfield re-visited

J. Holmes

109

1130 - 1145

Cyclone Yasi storm surge

G. Walker

113

1145 - 1200

Damage to low rise buildings during Tropical Cyclone Yasi

D. Henderson, G. Boughton, J. Ginger, J. Holmes, G. Walker, C. Leitch, L. Somerville, U.
Frye, N. Jayasinghe, P. Kim and G. Stark

117

1200 - 1215

A survey of wind and storm surge damage following Tropical Cyclone Yasi
N. Corby, M. Edwards, N. Habill, T. Maqsood and M. Wehner

121

1215 - 1230

125

Buildings used for shelter during Tropical Cyclone Yasi, places of refuge & public cyclone
shelters in Queensland
P. Mullins

This paper was not peer-reviewed.

1230 - 1330

Lunch

1330 - 1445

Session 7 Structural dynamics

Chair: Dr Mick Chay

1330 - 1345

Evaluation of HFBB analysis under the effects of surrounding buildings

K. Tse and K. Wong

129

1345 - 1400

Estimation of torsional loads on tall buildings

A. Rofail and N. Truong

133

1400 - 1415

Bifurcation prediction of the aeroelastic galloping model with structural and damping nonlinearities
G. Vio

137

1415 - 1430

Wind loads on extension of light towers at AAMI Stadium Adelaide

N. Mackenzie, J. Holmes, G. Rowland and J. Gaekwad

141

1430 - 1445

Close
AWES research priorities forum

1445 - 1600

15th Australasian Wind Engineering Society (AWES) Workshop

Sydney, Australia
23-24 February, 2012

Vortex formation above prismatic-shaped cliffs;

an experimental and numerical investigation
S. Cochard1 , A. Montlaur2 , D. F. Fletcher1 , C. W. Letchford3 and T. A. Earl1
1 Faculty

of Engineering and IT
The University of Sydney, Sydney, NSW 2006, Australia
2 Escola

dEnginyeria de Telecomunicacio i Aeroespacial de Castelldefels

`
Universitat Politecnica
de Catalunya, Castelldefels, Spain
3 Department of

Civil & Environmental Engineering

Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, Troy, NY, USA
circuit wind tunnel with a test section of 2.0 2.5 m and a fetch
of 20 meters. The fetch can be equipped with variable levels
of roughness to produce different boundary layer profiles with
specific turbulence characteristics. The maximum wind speed
in the boundary layer section is of the order of 16 m/s. A relatively rough 1:400 scale atmospheric boundary layer simulation
was developed using a trip-board, 4 spires and carpet roughness.

Abstract

Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) simulations and Particle Image Velocimetry (PIV) measurements are used to study
the flow over a cliff of isosceles prismatic elements arranged in
sawtooth patterns at a yaw angle of 0 . The CFD and the PIV
give similar results; as the flow approaches the cliffs, it accelerates and moves up to pass the obstruction and generates two
delta wing vortices on the top surface of the cliff.

The cliff face was composed of right-angled isosceles triangular

prisms, referred to as triangles hereafter. The model was made
from high-density polystyrene and all the triangular prisms had
a base length of 500 mm and a height of 100 mm. The middle triangle was made from plywood. The three components of
the velocity were measured in three horizontal planes over the
plywood cliff using a stereo-PIV system (David and Gicquel,
2006; Felli et al, 2002; Prasad, 2000). The turntable with the
attached model was rotated to simulate different incoming flow
angles. In Figure 1, the flow is moving from left to right, the
yaw angle of the cliff is 0 , and the coordinate system xyz is
fixed relative to the tunnel, with its zero at the centre of rotation
of the turntable. In this paper, by convention, the stream-wise
direction is along the x-axis and the upstream free flow does not
have any mean component along the y or z-axes.

Introduction

Wind Energy is one of the fastest growing sources of renewable

energy, adding 24% to its installed capacity in 2009 to reach
159GW worldwide (WWEA, 2010). Typically taking advantage of speed-up effects over topography, coastal and exposed
hilltops are preferred development sites. In Texas, which became the highest installed wind energy capacity state in the
US in 2008, escarpment sites were commonly being developed,
while on the south coast of Australia, many exposed headlands
were seen as potentially the best sites for wind farms. In a recent review, Ayotte (2010) indicated that such sites can generate substantial turbulence, particularly lateral turbulence that is
damaging to wind turbines and can seriously impact wind energy forecasts.

The stereo-PIV system, used to measure the three components

of the velocity, was composed of a double head 200 mJ-perpulse laser and two 11 MPx cameras. It was set up, in this case,
to measure the velocity on a plane of 0.3 0.2 m. For each test,
60 PIV velocity fields were recorded and averaged to compute
the mean flow and the turbulence intensity.

The present study was motivated to develop a better understanding of the flow generated over complex topography as a first step
in developing better site classifications, using wind-tunnel tests
and numerical simulations. Whereas the flow over a forward
facing step (a 2-dimensional cliff) has been well studied (Sherry
et al, 2010), the study of steep 3-dimensional topography, such
as found on inland escarpments and coastal headlands has received very little attention. The work of Glanville and Kwok
(1997) is one of the few experimental studies of steep topography that was linked to a specific full scale site where limited
field measurements were undertaken. However, the mountain
studied there was nominally 2-dimensional.

Wind-tunnel
wall

Turn table

Top View

Polystyrene
triangles

Flow

Middle
triangle
354

Top View

Region of
interest (ROI)

25

In the present study, first a series of wind-tunnel tests of

generic 3-dimensional topography utilising isosceles triangular elements arranged in sawtooth patterns were performed,
and second, Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) simulations
were studied to develop better understanding of flow complexity
over such surface level changes with shape and wind direction.

500
Pressure taps
positions

25

250

Reference angle
of the turn table

y
x

2500

Horizontal
laser sheet

15

Side View z

Base cliff
100

Laser
optics

Figure 1: Sketch of the configurations of the cliff model with

the positions of the PIV window.

Methods
Wind-Tunnel Tests

Figure 1 presents a sketch of the 2.5 m wide cliff model installed in the boundary layer wind tunnel of the School of Civil
Engineering at the University of Sydney. The tunnel is an open

The 5-triangle cliff spanned the full 2.5 m width of the wind
tunnel and was 4.7 m long with an additional 0.9 m long downstream wedge. The three components of the velocity were mea-

17

uBL [m/s]

250

simulations. A horizontal velocity boundary layer profile of

uBL = 1.14 ln(6119z + 1) in [m/s], where z is the height in
meters, a turbulence intensity of 0.17, corresponding to the experimental data, and an eddy viscosity ratio of 10 were set at the
inlet. The top boundary was also set as an inlet with the same
properties as the real inlet. An average static pressure of 0 Pa
was set at the outlet. The two lateral sides of the parallelepiped
were set as periodic boundaries (so only one triangular cliff was
simulated). The cliff ground was treated as a no-slip smooth
wall, whereas the ground upstream of the cliff was considered
as a rough wall with a sand-grain roughness of 0.015 m corresponding to a physical roughness of around 0.5 mm.

10
9

200

z [mm]

7
150

6
5

100

4
3

50

2
1

200

150

100

50

50

100

150

All numerical simulations were carried out with the commercial

CFD solver, ANSYS CFX13 (ANSYS 2010). CFX13 is based
on a coupled finite volume solver for the mass and momentum
(and energy if required) equations. The numerical scheme uses
a collocated pressure based method and a modified Rhie-Chow
algorithm to avoid decoupling. The resulting algebraic equations are solved by an algebraic multi-grid method. All velocity
calculations use a second order bounded differencing scheme
while a first order upwind scheme is implemented for the convective terms in the turbulence equations, and a second order
scheme is used for all diffusive terms.

x [mm]

Figure 2: Stream-wise velocity u, in the xz-plane, of the boundary layer without any obstacle.

sured over the middle prismatic cliff, at three different heights

above the cliff, for 9 different incoming flow angles. While the
measuring plane was set at 14.3 mm above the cliff, three incoming flow speeds (umax of 7, 9 and 12 m/s) were tested for
each angle to ensure that the results were independent of the
incoming flow velocity. For all other tests the velocity was constant (9 m/s). In this paper, only the PIV results at 14.3 mm
above the cliff, with 0 yaw angle, and a umax of 9 m/s are
presented.

The SST (Shear Stress Transport) model is used in this work.

It combines the k and the k models by way of a blending function Menter (1994). The blending function ensures that
the k model is used in the free shear region, while the k
model is used near walls so the flow is resolved through the
viscous sublayer. The SST model was designed to give highly
accurate predictions of the onset and the amount of flow separation under adverse pressure gradients by the inclusion of transport effects into the formulation of the eddy-viscosity ANSYS
(2010). This results in a major improvement in terms of flow
separation predictions. The superior performance of this model
has been demonstrated in a large number of validation studies
Bardina et al (1997). The curvature correction option was activated.

The PIV system was also set to measure the boundary layer
profile in a vertical plane without any obstruction (Figure 2).
Numerical Simulations

The flow being modelled is a steady flow, with a Reynolds number of approximately 100,000 based on the length of the triangular cliff and on the inlet velocity at the height of the cliff.
The fluid is air, considered incompressible and isothermal, at
a temperature of 25 C. The computational domain is shown in
Figure 3 and is 10 lcliff long (3 lcliff in front of the cliff) and
10 hcliff high, based on a cliff length (lcliff ) of 0.25 m and a
cliff height (hcliff ) of 0.1 m. The zone of interest of this simulation is a rectangle located at z = 0.1143 m above the cliff and
going for 0.2 m along the cliff, that is 0.1 m < x < 0.1 m
and 0.15 m < y < 0.15 m. This zone is where PIV data are
available.

The computational mesh was composed of 1.3 million tetrahedral elements. An inflation mesh comprising 30 layers was used
along the ground in front of and on top of the cliff, with a first
layer thickness of 0.1 mm. A body-sizing of 4 mm was used in
the region of interest, whereas a coarser body sizing of 20 mm
was used around the cliff. Within the computational mesh, the
coarsest size of element was set to 70 mm. A mesh dependency
was performed and it corroborated the choice of the mesh used
in this study.

The following boundary conditions were set for the numerical

z
yaw
y
pitch

Two convergence criteria were set. First, the root mean square
residuals were set to be below 104 . Second, three monitor
points were created at the height of interest z = 0.1143 m, one
centred at the beginning of the cliff and two others further
away along the cliff edge. The calculation was stopped when
values of velocity and pressure at these points did not change
anymore.

roll

Results
Delta wing vortex

The flow over the triangular shaped cliffs is similar to the flow
over a delta wing, (Johari and Moreira, 1998). As the flow approaches the cliffs, it accelerates and moves up to pass the obstruction. The streamlines in Figure 5 show the formation of the
vortices over the cliff, while Figure 4 compares quantitatively
the results obtained with the PIV and the CFD simulations.

Figure 3: Computational domain.

18

100

100

100

0.6

0.2
0

50

0.2
0

0.2
50

50

50

50

100

150

100
150

0.8

100

50

50

100

150

0.2
0

50

50

150

0.2
0

50

100
150

100

50

50

100

150

0.2
0.4
0.6
100
150

0.8

100

50

0.4

100

150

0.8

0.2
0

50

0.4
0.2

0.2
50

0.4

0.2
50

0.4

0.6
100
150

100

50

y [mm]

(g) PIV measured Mw

0.8

0.6

0.4
x [mm]

x [mm]

50

0.6
50

150

100

0.2
50

100

0.6

0.4

50

(f) CFD computed Mv ; inclined cliff

100

0
y [mm]

0.6

50

(e) CFD computed Mv ; ideal case

100

50

0.2
0

y [mm]

(d) PIV measured Mv

0.8

0.4

0.6

0.8

0.2

150

50

0.4

y [mm]

50

100

0.6

0.4

0.6
100

50

0.2

0.4

50

100

0.2

100

50

(c) CFD computed Mu ; inclined cliff

x [mm]

0.4

100
150

100

0.6

x [mm]

50
x [mm]

0.6
100
150

0.8

100

0.4

y [mm]

0.6

x [mm]

0.2

(b) CFD computed Mu ; ideal case

100

50

y [mm]

(a) PIV measured Mu

100

0.2
0

0.6

y [mm]

100
150

0.4

50

0.4

0.6
100

50

0.2

0.4

100
150

0.6

0.4
x [mm]

0.4
x [mm]

x [mm]

50

0.6

50

100

150

y [mm]

0.8

0.6
100
150

100

50

50

100

150

0.8

y [mm]

(h) CFD computed Mw ; ideal case

(i) CFD computed Mw ; inclined cliff

Figure 4: Speed-up ratio M = (Mu , Mv , Mw ) at z = 14.3 mm over the cliff. The first column ((a), (d) and (g)) represent the PIV results,
the second column ((b), (e) and (h)), the CFD results for an ideal case and the third column ((c), (f) and (i)), the CFD results for an
inclined cliff with a 1 roll angle and a 1 pitch angle.

results for an ideal case, where the cliff is horizontal and parallel to the floor. The speed-up results, in this case, are symmetric
over the triangle:

Speed-up ratio

All velocities presented in the following sections were normalized using the speed-up ratio M(z = h), computed as follows
for a given height h:
V
(z = h + hcliff ) VBL (z = h)
M(z = h) = cliff
|VBL (z = h)|

A speed-up ratio Mu (Figure 4b) between 0.3 and 0.5

(1)

where Vcliff is the mean velocity measured at a height h above

the cliff, hcliff is the height of the cliff, and, VBL is the mean
velocity of the boundary layer measured at a height h above
the wind tunnel floor without the cliff model. To simplify the
notation, the over-line above M was dropped even though the
speed-up ratio is defined as the mean value. A speed-up ratio of
1 represents an increase of velocity by a factor 2 over the cliff,
a speed-up ratio of 0 denotes no change in velocity and a speed
up ratio of 1 indicates a stagnation point with a velocity of
zero over the cliff.
Comparison of CFD and experimental data

Figure 4 compares the three components of the speed-up ratio

M = (Mu , Mv , Mw ) at z = 14.3 mm obtained from the PIV measurements (first column, Figures 4a, 4d and 4g) and two CFD
simulations (second and third columns, Figures 4b, 4e, 4h, 4c,
4f and 4i). The middle column of Figure 4 represents the CFD

Figure 5: Velocity streamlines around the cliff for an incoming

flow of 0 .

19

along the symmety axis of the triangle demonstrates an increase of the stream-wise velocity of 30 to 50% and could,
a priori, justify the installation of wind turbines on the top
of the cliff. As the power of a wind turbine is a function
of the velocity to the power of 3, the substantial power
gain from a speed-up ratio of 0.4 is 2.7. Away from the
axis of symmetry of the triangle, the speed-up ratio can
have negative values down to 0.5, which means that the
stream-wise velocity above the cliff is half the velocity of
the free stream at the same relative height h. Clearly these
are not good positions for a wind turbine as the power output is significantly reduced.

each cliff. These vortices are strong and turbulent and quite
sensitive to the pitch and roll angles. The speed-up ratio over a
triangular cliff with a yaw angle of 0 ranges from -0.8 to 0.8,
i.e, from a velocity that is only 20% of the free stream velocity
to a velocity of 180%. The complexity of the flow field has been
revealed in this unique three-dimensional study and makes this a
difficult region for taking full advantage of potential speedup effects associated with cliffs for wind energy considerations. The
CFD results, combined with the PIV measurements, proved to
be very valuable to fully understand the flow over the cliff and
can be an essential tool to position the wind-turbine.
*

Mw (Figure 4h) clearly shows an upward flow upstream

of the cliff with a maximum upward velocity at the cliff
edge. Once the wind has passed the edge, the two vortices
start to form and grow in a cone of 30 .

References

ANSYS (2010) CFX users manual. URL www.ansys.com

Mv (Figure 4e) displays the growth of the vortex cone both

in the vertical and horizontal axis. Close to the tip of
the triangle, the 14.3-mm high measurement plane only
records an inward Mv flow; the measurement plane is at
the top edge of the vortices. Closer to the downstream end
of the triangle, Mv is of opposite sign, indicating an outward flow (from the centre of the triangle to the edge); the
measurement plane is in the lower part of the vortices.

Ayotte K (2010) Physical and computational modelling of

topographically generated wake turbulence. In: Cechet B
(ed) 14th Australasian Wind Engineering Society Workshop,
AWES, Geoscience Australia
Bardina J, Huang P, Coakley T (1997) Turbulence modeling
validation testing and development. NASA Technical Memorandum 110446
David L, Gicquel P (2006) Evolutions de la technique PIV a`
travers quelques conferences internationales de 2000 a` aujourdhui. In: Congr`es Francophone de Techniques Laser,
CFTL, Toulouse, France

A wind turbine positioned in one of these vortices would face

not only a large velocity gradient, as the amplitude and direction
of the incoming flow vary, but also a strong level of turbulence.
The PIV results, contrary to the ideal CFD case, show nonsymmetric results; the vortex on the right side of the triangle
is larger than the one on the left. The asymmetry is particularly
visible on Figure 4d; the centre of rotation of the windward vortex crosses the measurement plane about 20 mm upstream of
the leeward vortex centre of rotation. Once the vortex centre
of rotation crosses the measurement plan, the component v of
the velocity changes direction from inward (toward the centre
of the triangle) to outward (toward the edge of the triangle).

Felli M, Pereira F, Calcagno G, Felice FD (2002) Application

of stereo-PIV: Propeller wake analysis in a large circulating
water channel. In: 11th Int. Symp. on Applications of Laser
Techniques to Fluid Mechanics, Lisbon, Portugal
Glanville MJ, Kwok KCS (1997) Measurements of topographic
multipliers and flow separation from a steep escarpment, part
II: Model-scale measurements. Journal of Wind Engineering
and Industrial Aerodynamics 69-71:893902

The turntable, on which the model of the cliff is fixed , was not
sufficiently rigid and had a small (< 1 ) roll and pitch angle.
The third column of Figure 4 shows the results of the CFD simulations with the triangular cliff inclined with a 1 roll angle and
a 1 pitch angle. These results are consistent both qualitatively
and quantitatively with the PIV results. The shape of the vortices was found to be more sensitive to the roll and pitch angle
than to the yaw angle. When the cliff is not sitting perfectly horizontal, one side of the triangle is showing a higher cliff surface
(right side) than the other one (left side) and, as a result, creates
a larger vortex.

Johari H, Moreira J (1998) Direct measurement of delta-wing

vortex circulation. AIAA Journal 36(12):21952203
Menter F (1994) Two-equation eddy-viscosity turbulence models for engineering applications. AIAA Journal 32(8):1598
1605
Prasad AK (2000) Stereoscopic particle image velocimetry. Experiments in Fluids 29(2):103116
Sherry M, Lo Jacono D, Sheridan J (2010) An experimental
investigation of the recirculation zone formed downstream
of a forward facing step. Journal of Wind Engineering and
Industrial Aerodynamics 98(12):888894

Discussion

Both the CFD simulations and the wind tunnel tests give, as
anticipated, similar results. The PIV measurements over the
cliff presented non-symmetric results, which could not be interpreted before the CFD simulations were carried on. The CFD
simulation highlighted the sensitivity of vortex formation to the
roll and pitch angles. With a pitch and roll angle of 1 the CFD
simulations are in good agreement with the PIV results. After investigating the experimental setup, it was confirmed, that,
once the cliff model is in place, the turntable had a 1 roll and
pitch angle.

WWEA (2010) World Wind Energy Report. World Wind Energy Association

Conclusion

When an atmospheric boundary layer flow passes over generic

triangular-shape cliffs, two delta-wing vortices are created on

20