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Engineering and technology
- Installation techniques
- Coastal and estuarine hydraulics
- Energy generation, conversion and storage engineering not elsewehere classified
- Hydrodynamics
- Marine engineering not elsewehere classified
Moored floating structures are connected to the seabed through mooring line systems composed of cables or chains, and have wide applications in coastal and offshore engineering. Moored floating offshore wind turbines and Wave Energy Converters (WECs) are examples of such structures from the field of Marine Renewable Energy (MRE). Mooring systems can represent a considerable part of the total cost of MRE technologies and they influence their hydrodynamics. Therefore it is crucial to accurately model their behavior in a cost-efficient way. In the proposed research this will be achieved by employing a Smoothed Particle Hydrodynamics model as the basis of a numerical platform able to accurately predict the behaviour of moored floating structures and WECs with their power take-off systems, in operational and in extreme sea states. The developed numerical platform will be validated using the experimental database obtained from the upcoming ‘WECfarm' project where WEC interactions in farm configurations will be studied experimentally at the Coastal & Ocean Basin (Ostend). The main objectives of the proposed research aim to cover current knowledge gaps which hamper further development and commercialisation of these MRE emerging technologies. Results' valorisation will be achieved through scientific dissemination and cooperation with academic and industrial players from the offshore and the MRE sectors who have direct interest in the outcome of this fundamental research project.