Environment Minister Franz Untersteller Visits Institute of Aerodynamics and Gas Dynamics

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On March 18, 2015, Baden-Württemberg Environment Minister Franz Untersteller and Nikolaus Tschenk, member of the State Parliament of Baden-Württemberg, visited the Institute of Aerodynamics and Gas Dynamics (Institut für Aerodynamik und Gasdynamik – IAG) on the University’s Vaihingen campus. They were accompanied by Professor Wolfgang Ressel, Rector of the University.

Mr Untersteller and Mr Tschenk were especially interested in wind energy research activities and visited the gust wind tunnel, the laminar wind tunnel and the wind tunnel for boundary-layer research. These wind tunnels are used to test wind turbines, to design and dimension new and modern airfoils for turbine rotors and to investigate flows for different kinds of landscape models.

Later on Professor Ewald Krämer and Dr. Thorsten Lutz talked about the IAG’s wind energy research activities. Professor Krzysztof Rudion of the Institute of Power Transmission and High Voltage Technology (Institut für Energieübertragung und Hochspannungstechnik – IEH) and Professor Po Wen Cheng of the Stuttgart Wind Energy Chair (Stuttgarter Lehrstuhl für Windenergie – SWE) held talks on grid integration of renewable energies and wind energy in Baden-Württemberg. The IAG, IEH and SWE are all founding members of WindForS – the Southern German Wind Energy Research Cluster whose office is also located on the University’s Vaihingen Campus. The other WindForS institutes at the University of Stuttgart as well as the competencies of the whole cluster were the subject of an overview lecture held by Andreas Rettenmeier. Mr Rettenmeier also talked about the current status of the wind energy test site planned by the WindForS partners to be erected in southern Germany. A video on the test site and a test site model illustrated these plans. The test site is meant to serve as a testing platform for research and industry. Its design is currently being elaborated in a project funded by the Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Energy.

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