Conceptual design and numerical simulations of a vertical axis water turbine used for underwater mooring platforms

Wenlong Tian, Baowei Song, Zhaoyong Mao

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

35 Scopus citations

Abstract

Energy is a direct restriction to the working life of an underwater mooring platform (UMP). In this paper, a vertical axis water turbine (VAWT) is designed to supply energy for UMPs. The VAWT has several controlled blades, which can be opened or closed by inside plunger pumps. Two-dimensional transient numerical studies are presented to determine the operating performance and power output of the turbine under low ocean current velocity. A standard k-ε turbulence model is used to perform the transient simulations. The influence of structural parameters, including foil section profile, foil chord length and rotor diameter, on the turbine performance are investigated over a range of tip-speed-ratios (TSRs). It was found that turbine with three unit length NACA0015 foils generated a maximum averaged coefficient of power, 0.1, at TSR = 2.

Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)625-634
Number of pages10
JournalInternational Journal of Naval Architecture and Ocean Engineering
Volume5
Issue number4
DOIs
StatePublished - 2013

Keywords

  • Computational fluid dynamics
  • Underwater mooring platform
  • Water turbine

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