Title: An alternative approach to estimate the hydrodynamic efficiency of an oscillating water column using computational fluid dynamics

Authors: Utku Şentürk; Aydoğan Özdamar

Addresses: Faculty of Engineering, Mechanical Engineering Department, Bornova 35100, İzmir, Turkey ' Naval Architecture and Maritime Faculty Department of Naval Architecture and Marine Engineering, Beşiktaş 34349, Istanbul, Turkey

Abstract: A well known property of Oscillating Water Column (OWC) type wave energy converters is the approximately linear pressure drop-volume flow rate relation due to the Wells turbine equipment. This work presents a novel method where this relation is defined as a boundary condition in time domain simulations. The interaction of the OWC with regular, small waves in a tank is the boundary value problem that is under consideration. The finite volume method-based solver Fluent is used with two dimensional, incompressible, unsteady, two-phase flow assumptions. The turbine parameter that relates the pressure drop and flow rate is determined using linearised theory.

Keywords: ocean energy; wave power; wave energy converters; computational fluid dynamics; CFD; numerical wave tank; OWC; oscillating water column; hydrodynamic efficiency; time domain simulation; incompressible flow; two-phase flow; dimensional flow.

DOI: 10.1504/PCFD.2013.052426

Progress in Computational Fluid Dynamics, An International Journal, 2013 Vol.13 No.2, pp.120 - 129

Published online: 31 Oct 2013 *

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