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

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.