A Dual-Rotor Aerodynamic Configuration for Integrated Wind Energy Harvesting and Thrust Production

This study investigates the aerodynamic feasibility of a counter-rotating dual-rotor system designed to perform both wind energy harvesting and thrust generation using a single blade architecture. The system employs symmetric airfoil profiles and independent control of pitch angle and rotational speed to emulate geometric asymmetry, allowing mode switching without reconfiguring the blades. Blade Element Momentum (BEM) analysis demonstrates that the configuration can achieve high power coefficients in energy-harvesting mode and moderate hovering performance in thrust mode. The results indicate that although the blades are optimized for energy harvesting, the dual-rotor configuration enhances adaptability, particularly through the additional wake swirl available to the rear rotor during counter-rotation. These findings suggest that a horizontally aligned counter-rotating system can serve as a multifunctional aerodynamic solution for compact platforms requiring both renewable power generation and propulsion. Future work will expand the parameter space and employ computational fluid dynamics and wind tunnel experiments to further assess performance and characterize the flow field.