With growing awareness of climate change and an increased interest in renewable energy, resources like offshore wind are projected to grow in the near future. One key issue within offshore wind is how to stabilize the floating system when it experiences large wind and wave forces that impact its performance and shorten its operating life. Researchers have been exploring structural control methods and creating modeling tools to evaluate the performance of the control methods. One such tool is OpenFAST, the industry standard for modeling wind turbine dynamics, and the goal of this paper is to build upon the existing capabilities of OpenFAST. Inerter-based structural control methods offer arguably better performance than traditional vibration absorbers, and the configuration proposed in this paper also offers the ability to use a generator as an element in the structural controller. This allows extra energy to be generated along with the improvement in vibration absorption. Through this study, this inerter-based control method is explored through the lens of an established modeling tool to provide the validation for the model to explore which load cases the inerter performs best in and what design considerations must be made. In addition, the energy harvesting potential of the inerter system is evaluated and shown to increase the system's capabilities especially under stormy ocean conditions. / Master of Science / With growing awareness of climate change and an increased interest in renewable energy, resources like offshore wind are projected to grow in the near future. One key issue within offshore wind is how to stabilize the floating system when it experiences large wind and wave forces which impact its performance and shorten its lifespan. Researchers have been exploring several methods and creating modeling tools to evaluate the performance of control methods. One such tool is OpenFAST, the industry standard for modeling wind turbine dynamics, and the goal of this paper is to build upon the existing capabilities of OpenFAST. Structural control methods based on an element called an inerter offer arguably better performance than traditional vibration absorbers. The design in this paper also offers the ability to use an electrical generator as an element in the structural controller. This allows extra energy to be generated along with the reduced vibrations. Through this study, this inerter-based control method is explored through the lens of an established modeling tool to provide validation for the model. Another goal is to explore which scenarios the inerter performs best and what design considerations must be made for future development. In addition, the energy harvesting potential of the inerter system is evaluated and shown to increase the system's capabilities.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:VTETD/oai:vtechworks.lib.vt.edu:10919/115785 |
| Date | 17 July 2023 |
| Creators | Okuda, Ryan Rikio |
| Contributors | Mechanical Engineering, Zuo, Lei, Fang, Biao, Sandu, Corina |
| Publisher | Virginia Tech |
| Source Sets | Virginia Tech Theses and Dissertation |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Thesis |
| Format | ETD, application/pdf |
| Rights | In Copyright, http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/ |
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