scholarly journals Uncertainty Assessment of CFD Investigation of the Nonlinear Difference-Frequency Wave Loads on a Semisubmersible FOWT Platform

2020 ◽  
Vol 13 (1) ◽  
pp. 64
Author(s):  
Lu Wang ◽  
Amy Robertson ◽  
Jason Jonkman ◽  
Yi-Hsiang Yu

Current mid-fidelity modeling approaches for floating offshore wind turbines (FOWTs) have been found to underpredict the nonlinear, low-frequency wave excitation and the response of semisubmersible FOWTs. To examine the cause of this underprediction, the OC6 project is using computational fluid dynamics (CFD) tools to investigate the wave loads on the OC5-DeepCwind semisubmersible, with a focus on the nonlinear difference-frequency excitation. This paper focuses on assessing the uncertainty of the CFD predictions from simulations of the semisubmersible in a fixed condition under bichromatic wave loading and on establishing confidence in the results for use in improving mid-fidelity models. The uncertainty for the nonlinear wave excitation is found to be acceptable but larger than that for the wave-frequency excitation, with the spatial discretization error being the dominant contributor. Further, unwanted free waves at the difference frequency have been identified in the CFD solution. A wave-splitting and wave load-correction procedure are presented to remove the contamination from the free waves in the results. A preliminary comparison to second-order potential-flow theory shows that the CFD model predicted significantly higher difference-frequency wave excitations, especially in surge, suggesting that the CFD results can be used to better calibrate the mid-fidelity tools.

Author(s):  
Hyebin Lee ◽  
Yoon Hyeok Bae ◽  
Kyong-Hwan Kim ◽  
Sewan Park ◽  
Keyyong Hong

A wind-wave hybrid power generation system is a floating offshore energy platform which is equipped with a number of wind turbines and wave energy converters (WECs) to harvest energy from various resources. This wind-wave hybrid platform is moored by eight catenary lines to keep its position against wind-wave-current environment. In most cases, the resonant frequency of horizontal motion of moored platform is very low, so a resonance is hardly seen by numerical simulation with linear wave assumptions. However, the incident waves with different frequency components are accompanied by sum and difference frequency loads due to the nonlinearity of the waves. Typically, the magnitude of the second-order wave loads are small and negligible, but once the second-order wave loads excite the platform at its natural frequency, the resonance can take place, which results in adverse effects on the platform. In this paper, the second-order difference frequency wave load on the wind-wave hybrid platform is numerically assessed and time domain simulation by coupled platform-mooring dynamic analysis is carried out. As a result, the horizontal motions of the platform was highly excited and the increased motions led higher top tension of the mooring lines compared with the case of linear wave environment. Especially, the combination of the wind and wave loads excited the horizontal motions more and made the mooring top tension far higher than wave load was only applied. With regards to the second-order difference frequency wave load, the result with the Quadratic Transfer Function (QTF) is compared to the one with Newman’s approximation. As the simulation results between them was insignificant, the Newman’s approximation can be used instead of the complete QTF to reduce the computational effort.


Author(s):  
Xiao-Bo Chen ◽  
Fla´via Rezende

As the main source of resonant excitations to most offshore moored systems like floating LNG terminals, the low-frequency wave loading is the critical input to motion simulations which are important for the design. Further to the analysis presented by Chen & Duan (2007) and Chen & Rezende (2008) on the quadratic transfer function (QTF) of low-frequency wave loading, the new formulation of QTF is developed by the series expansion of the second-order wave loading with respect to the difference-frequency upto the order-2. It provides a novel method to evaluate the low-frequency second-order wave loads in a more accurate than usual order-0 approximation (often called Newman approximation) and more efficient way comparing to the computation of complete QTF. New developments including numerical results of different components of QTF are presented here. Furthermore, the time-series reconstruction of excitation loads in the motion simulation of mooring systems is analyzed and a new efficient and accurate scheme is demonstrated.


Author(s):  
Lu Wang ◽  
Amy Robertson ◽  
Jason Jonkman ◽  
Yi-Hsiang Yu ◽  
Arjen Koop ◽  
...  

Abstract The natural surge and pitch frequencies of semisubmersible offshore wind platforms are typically designed to be below the wave frequencies to avoid direct excitation. However, surge or pitch resonance can be excited by the nonlinear low-frequency loads generated by irregular incident waves. Second-order potential-flow models with added Morison drag have been found to underpredict this low-frequency excitation and response. As part of the OC6 project1, the authors performed computational fluid dynamics (CFD) simulations to enable a better understanding of the low-frequency loads and the limitations of lower-fidelity models. The focus of this paper is to set up a computationally cost-effective CFD simulation of a fixed semisubmersible platform to investigate nonlinear difference-frequency loads and establish the corresponding uncertainty in the results. Because of the high computing cost, CFD simulations of irregular waves can be challenging. Instead, simulations were performed with bichromatic waves having a shorter repeat period. A preliminary comparison with quadratic transfer functions from second-order potential-flow theory shows that CFD models consistently predict higher nonlinear wave loads at the difference frequency, likely because of flow separation and viscous drag not accounted for in potential-flow theory.


Author(s):  
Monica J. Holboke ◽  
Robert G. Grant

This paper presents the results of a two-body analysis for a moored ship sheltered by a breakwater in shallow water with and without free surface forcing in the low frequency wave load calculation. The low frequency wave loads are determined by second order interactions from the first order. The free surface forcing term arises from the free surface boundary condition, which is trivial to first order but is not at second order. We demonstrate in the frequency domain the importance of this term in a two-body analysis. Additionally, we show how inaccurate calculations of the off-diagonal terms of the Quadratic Transfer Function can translate to over or under prediction of low frequency wave loads on moored ships sheltered by breakwaters in shallow water. Low frequency wave load accuracy has direct consequence for LNG marine terminal design. Generally, LNG marine terminals are sited in sheltered harbors, however increasingly they are being proposed in offshore locations where they will require protection from persistent waves and swells. Since breakwaters typically cost twice as much as the rest of the marine facilities, it is important to optimize their size, orientation and location. In a previous paper we described this optimization process [1], which identified a key step to be the transforming of waves just offshore the breakwater into wave loads on the moored ships. The ability to do this step accurately is of critical importance because if the loads are too large, the breakwater will be larger and more expensive than necessary and if the loads are too small, the terminal will experience excessive downtime and loss of revenue.


Author(s):  
Paul D. Sclavounos ◽  
Yu Zhang ◽  
Yu Ma ◽  
David F. Larson

The development of an analytical model for the prediction of the stochastic nonlinear wave loads on the support structure of bottom mounted and floating offshore wind turbines is presented. Explicit expressions are derived for the time-domain nonlinear exciting forces in a sea state with significant wave height comparable to the diameter of the support structure based on the fluid impulse theory (FIT). The method is validated against experimental measurements with good agreement. The higher order moments of the nonlinear load are evaluated from simulated force records and the derivation of analytical expressions for the nonlinear load statistics for their efficient use in design is addressed. The identification of the inertia and drag coefficients of a generalized nonlinear wave load model trained against experiments using support vector machine learning algorithms is discussed.


Author(s):  
Paul D. Sclavounos ◽  
Yu Zhang ◽  
Yu Ma ◽  
David F. Larson

The development is presented of an analytical model for the prediction of the stochastic nonlinear wave loads on the support structure of bottom mounted and floating offshore wind turbines. Explicit expressions are derived for the time-domain nonlinear exciting forces in a seastate with significant wave height comparable to the diameter of the support structure based on the fluid impulse theory. The method is validated against experimental measurements with good agreement. The higher order moments of the nonlinear load are evaluated from simulated force records and the derivation of analytical expressions for the nonlinear load statistics for their efficient use in design is addressed. The identification of the inertia and drag coefficients of a generalized nonlinear wave load model trained against experiments using Support Vector Machine learning algorithms is discussed.


2020 ◽  
Vol 8 (11) ◽  
pp. 859
Author(s):  
Thanh-Dam Pham ◽  
Hyunkyoung Shin

Floating offshore wind turbines (FOWTs) have been installed in Europe and Japan with relatively modern technology. The installation of floating wind farms in deep water is recommended because the wind speed is stronger and more stable. The design of the FOWT must ensure it is able to withstand complex environmental conditions including wind, wave, current, and performance of the wind turbine. It needs simulation tools with fully integrated hydrodynamic-servo-elastic modeling capabilities for the floating offshore wind turbines. Most of the numerical simulation approaches consider only first-order hydrodynamic loads; however, the second-order hydrodynamic loads have an effect on a floating platform which is moored by a catenary mooring system. At the difference-frequencies of the incident wave components, the drift motion of a FOWT system is able to have large oscillation around its natural frequency. This paper presents the effects of second-order wave loads to the drift motion of a semi-submersible type. This work also aimed to validate the hydrodynamic model of Ulsan University (UOU) in-house codes through numerical simulations and model tests. The NREL FAST code was used for the fully coupled simulation, and in-house codes of UOU generates hydrodynamic coefficients as the input for the FAST code. The model test was performed in the water tank of UOU.


2005 ◽  
Vol 127 (2) ◽  
pp. 242-252 ◽  
Author(s):  
Niels Jacob Tarp-Johansen

Background: The present paper regards the concerted action of wind and wave loads on offshore wind turbines in the extreme storm event. The load combination problem involves the definition of the characteristic loads and safety factors. In wind engineering and offshore engineering well established practices for the definition of characteristic values and safety factors for wind and wave loads separately exist. The aim is to investigate the possibility of making a simple merger of these existing practices into a possibly conservative design rule. Method of Approach: The paper applies a simplified probabilistic approach giving an understanding of how the merging can possibly be established and finally gives first guidance on the choice of characteristic values and safety factors. Results and conclusions: Under the assumptions made herein, it is made probable that a simple combination rule can be established.


Author(s):  
Atsushi Yamashita ◽  
Kinji Sekita

For the design of offshore wind turbines exposed to wind and wave loads, the method of combining the wind load and the wave load is significantly important to properly calculate the maximum stresses and deflections of the towers and the foundations1). Similarly, for the analysis of the fatigue damage critical to the structural life, the influences of combined wind and wave loads have not been clearly verified. In this paper fatigue damage at the time of typhoon passing is analyzed using actually recorded data, though intrinsically long-term data more than 10years should be used to properly evaluate the fatigue damage. This paper concludes that the fatigue damage of the tower caused by the wave load is not substantial and, thus, the fatigue damage by the combined wind and wave load is only 2–3% larger than the simple addition of the independent fatigue damages by the wind and the wave loads. The fatigue damage of the tower top, which is required to reduce the diameter in order to minimize the aerodynamic confliction with blades, is larger than that of the tower bottom. The fatigue damage at the foundation by the combined wind and wave load is 25% larger than the simple addition of the wind and wave damages, as the foundation is directly exposed to the wave load. For the foundation, the proper structural section can be designed in order to improve the structural performance against fatigue.


Author(s):  
Olaf J. Waals

Operability of offshore moored ships can be affected by low frequency wave loads. The low frequency motions of a moored ship may limit the uptime of an offshore structure such as an LNG offloading terminal. The wave loads that cause the main excitation of these low frequency motions are usually computed using second order wave drift theory for long crested waves, which assumes that the low frequency components are only related to waves coming from the same direction. In this method short crested seas are dealt with as a summation of long crested seas, but no interaction between the wave components traveling in different directions is usually taken into account. This paper describes the results of a study to the effect of 2nd order low frequency wave loads in directional seas. For this study the drift forces related to the interaction between waves coming from different directions is also included. This is done by computing the quadratic transfer functions (QTF) for all possible combinations of wave components (frequencies and directions). Time traces of drift forces are generated and compared to the results without wave directional interaction after which the motions of an LNG carrier are simulated. A sensitivity study is carried out towards the number of direction steps and the water depth. Finally the motions of an LNG carrier in shallow water (15m water depth) are simulated and mooring forces are compared for various amounts of wave spreading.


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