University of Toronto Wind Turbine Team (UTWind)

UTWind is a 2 year old multidisciplinary student design team with a mission to build and grow a community of students at the University of Toronto interested in the field of wind energy. We help students gain experience through theoretical and experiential learning.

Please visit our website: www.utwind.com

UTWind helps students become professionals in a variety of contexts, including engineering, sustainable development, and community planning. Through supporting our team, we hope to make a difference, particularly in resolving the climate change-exacerbated energy crisis. We also hope to inspire more University of Toronto students to join our team and change the future.

UTWind will participate in the International Small Wind Turbine Contest in the Netherlands (June 2024). Over September 2023 to June 2024, our strong team of members comprising of students from various academic disciplines at the University of Toronto have been able to create a design that is competition ready. With our prior experience, inter-disciplinary knowledge, and diverse skill sets, we hope to excel in the competition.

Our team consists of 5 sub-teams; Mechanical, Controls, Power, Aerodynamics, and Sustainability. The power sub-team focuses on taking in mechanical energy from the turbine and outputting a 60V and 20A of power. We do this through using a 3 phase generator (Figure 1) and rectifying the power. This rectified power is then fed into a buck-boost converter (Figure 2). Most of the students in our team have no experience with creating these advanced pcbs with high power readings. For this reason, our team would greatly benefit from a sponsorship from PCB way. With a current output of 20A and voltage of 60V, the team has chosen to appropriately heat distribute using heat sinks and 4 layers of 2oz copper.

UTWind is confident in their design and aims to develop and inspire others in the future. With support from PCBWay, we hope to turn our vision into reality and continue fostering innovation and inspiration.

Figure 1: Generator

Figure 2: Buck-Boost circuit