> So the question is, does ducting help smaller scale turbines, and will placing smaller scale turbines where big turbines won't fit going to be worthwhile?
Simple ducting does help some. A group at Clarkson has been working on this. They have a wind tunnel, so they can get solid data. [1] They have a simple duct around a standard wind turbine. This gives the effect of more intake area, and they get almost twice the output power. Unclear if this is cheaper than just increasing the blade length.
Many people have been down this road. There are many, many variants on experimental ducted wind turbines. Just search for "ducted wind turbine". There are very few installations. Here's one of the few.[2] They're demo installations on college campuses.
Simple ducting does help some. A group at Clarkson has been working on this. They have a wind tunnel, so they can get solid data. [1] They have a simple duct around a standard wind turbine. This gives the effect of more intake area, and they get almost twice the output power. Unclear if this is cheaper than just increasing the blade length.
Many people have been down this road. There are many, many variants on experimental ducted wind turbines. Just search for "ducted wind turbine". There are very few installations. Here's one of the few.[2] They're demo installations on college campuses.
[1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EXxA-RkwuRY
[2] https://www.ductedwind.com/blog