Speaker
Description
Wind energy has emerged as one of the most promising renewable energy sources. Furthermore, floating offshore wind turbines have enabled increased power generation in intermediate (45-150 m) and deep water (>150 m). However, the production, installation, and operation of wind turbines can produce considerable amounts of greenhouse gas emissions. This paper proposes a new hybrid glulam-steel floating substructure design for the IEA 15 MW floating wind turbine as an attempt to enhance the floating wind energy development with minimal cost and CO2 footprint. The new design aims to replace steel with glued laminated timber (glulam) and presents a modified version of the UMaine VolturnUS-S semisubmersible platform that was initially developed for the IEA 15 MW turbine. First, Ansys workbench 2020 R1 is utilized to assess and then choose amongst three preliminary hybrid timber-steel models based on a set of criteria gathered from relevant timber and steel standards. In comparison to the UMaine VolturnUS-S semisubmersible platform, the selected hybrid design saves about 590 t of steel mass. Following that, a fully coupled aero-hydro-servo-elastic dynamic study is performed using OpenFAST to validate the chosen model. Only the ultimate limit state design (ULS) under normal and extreme operating conditions is considered. The results reveal that the glulam supporting structure is a good load-bearing solution for the IEA 15 MW turbine, with a utilization factor ranging from 74 to 94%
| Conference Topic Areas | Track2: Advanced Computational Methods and Applications in Marine, Subsea and Offshore Technology |
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