This simulator models how a utility-scale horizontal-axis wind turbine turns moving air into grid electricity — from the kinetic power crossing the swept rotor disk, through aerodynamic capture, drivetrain and generator conversion, to a supervisory output limit. Adjust wind speed, rotor geometry, pitch and yaw and watch every stage of the energy path respond.
• A real-time 3D cutaway of the nacelle and rotor — blades, hub & pitch bearings, low-speed shaft, gearbox, generator & converter and tower — with a toggleable enclosure, auto-rotate, expand and selectable components with callouts, plus a home view and a hide-labels toggle for an unobstructed view. • Turbine operating point controls: wind speed (0–30 m/s), air density (0.9–1.4 kg/m³), rotor radius (10–40 m), regulated rotor speed (5–35 rpm), blade pitch (0–60°) and yaw misalignment (0–75°), plus drivetrain/generator efficiency (70–98%). • Six live metrics: electrical output, wind power through the swept area, effective power coefficient, rotor speed, tip-speed ratio and conversion loss. • Time controls: pause/resume, advance 0.1 s, advance 1 s, and a playback speed selector from 10x slow motion to real time to 10x and 60x faster. • A Power & efficiency tab with two live charts, the underlying model equations (Pwind, tip-speed ratio λ, the Cp surface and the output-limiting relation) and a stated model scope, plus snapshot measurements. • An Experiments tab with five guided experiments (wind-speed sensitivity, yaw error, pitch to feather, below cut-in, high-wind cut-out), a Model verification bench that runs the checks.js suite of deterministic checks against a fresh model instance, and a timestamped event log with a trial-report export. • A Learn & assess tab with guided lessons, a three-question knowledge-check quiz and a written scope-and-references statement linking to NREL technical background.
Wind carries kinetic power through the rotor's swept disk equal to ½ρπR²v³ — it scales with air density, the square of rotor radius and the cube of wind speed, which is why doubling wind speed increases available power eightfold. Only a fraction of that power can be extracted: the modeled power coefficient Cp depends on tip-speed ratio λ = ωR/v, blade pitch and yaw misalignment, and peaks at Cp = 0.46 — below the ideal Betz limit of 16/27 — near λ ≈ 7.5.
Mechanical power passes through an ideal governed low-speed shaft and an illustrative geared drivetrain (with aggregated losses set by the efficiency control) to the generator, which is rated at 1.5 MW. Below a cut-in wind speed the turbine generates nothing even if the rotor is turning; at and above a 25 m/s cut-out, an ideal supervisory controller drives delivered output to zero. Between those limits, output is capped at the 1.5 MW rating even when aerodynamic capture would supply more.
The Power & efficiency tab's charts and snapshot readouts let you isolate each stage: compare wind power in the swept area against delivered electrical output to see how much is lost to imperfect aerodynamic capture, drivetrain/generator efficiency and rating-driven curtailment. The five built-in experiments walk through the model's key sensitivities — v³ scaling, cos³(yaw) capture loss from misalignment, pitch-to-feather derating, cut-in inhibition and cut-out shutdown — each with a one-line explanation of the expected result.
This is a teaching model, not manufacturer performance data or blade-element aerodynamics: rotor speed is held by an ideal test-fixture governor with a stated response, and blade loads, wake interactions, noise and grid electrical transients are outside its scope. The Model verification bench runs the checks.js suite of deterministic checks (Cp bounded by the Betz limit, v³ scaling, cos³ yaw loss, cut-out and rating enforcement) against a freshly constructed model, leaving your live experiment untouched.
Kinetic power in the wind scales with the cube of wind speed (Pwind = ½ρπR²v³), so at a fixed power coefficient, doubling wind speed increases the power available to the rotor eightfold. Delivered electrical output still depends on aerodynamic capture (Cp), drivetrain/generator efficiency and the 1.5 MW rating ceiling.
Cp is the fraction of the wind power crossing the swept rotor disk that the rotor can convert to mechanical power — it is not generator efficiency. This model's Cp peaks at 0.46 near a tip-speed ratio of 7.5 and falls off with blade pitch and yaw misalignment; it stays below the ideal Betz limit of 16/27 across the full range of tip-speed ratio and pitch tested by the verification bench.
The Experiments tab includes a Model verification bench that runs the checks.js suite of automated, deterministic checks — including that Cp never exceeds the Betz limit, that doubling wind speed gives eightfold incident power, that yaw misalignment reduces capture by cos³(yaw), that cut-out suppresses delivered power, and that output never exceeds the 1.5 MW rating — against a freshly constructed model instance, independent of your live experiment.
This is a teaching model using a transparent analytic Cp surface, not manufacturer performance data or blade-element aerodynamics. Rotor speed is governed by an ideal test fixture with a 1.5 s response; blade loads, wake interactions, noise and grid electrical transients are excluded, and the power-limiting behavior represents ideal supervisory derating rather than a real pitch/torque control system.