A note on the effects of local blockage and dynamic tuning on tidal turbine performance

Numerical simulations are used to explore the potential for local blockage effects and dynamic tuning strategies to enhance the performance of turbines in tidal channels. Fulland partial-width arrays of turbines, modelled using the volume-flux-constrained actuator disc and blade element momentum the...

Full description

Bibliographic Details
Main Authors: Chen, L, Bonar, PAJ, Vogel, C, Adcock, T
Format: Journal article
Language:English
Published: American Society of Mechanical Engineers 2020
_version_ 1797100631565008896
author Chen, L
Bonar, PAJ
Vogel, C
Adcock, T
author_facet Chen, L
Bonar, PAJ
Vogel, C
Adcock, T
author_sort Chen, L
collection OXFORD
description Numerical simulations are used to explore the potential for local blockage effects and dynamic tuning strategies to enhance the performance of turbines in tidal channels. Fulland partial-width arrays of turbines, modelled using the volume-flux-constrained actuator disc and blade element momentum theories, are embedded within a two-dimensional channel with a naturally low ratio of drag to inertial forces. For steady flow, the local blockage effect observed by varying the cross-stream spacing between the turbines is found to agree very well with the predictions of the two-scale actuator disc theory of Nishino and Willden (2012, “The efficiency of an array of tidal turbines partially blocking a wide channel”, J. Fluid Mech., vol. 708, pp. 596–606). For oscillatory flow, however, results show that, consistent with the findings of Bonar et al. (2019, “On the arrangement of tidal turbines in rough and oscillatory channel flow”, J. Fluid Mech., vol. 865, pp. 790–810), the shorter and more highly blocked arrays produce considerably more power than predicted by two-scale theory. Results also show that, consistent with the findings of Vennell (2016, “An optimal tuning strategy for tidal turbines”, Proc. R. Soc. A., vol. 472, p. 20160047), the ‘dynamic’ tuning strategy, in which the tuning of the turbines is varied over the tidal cycle, can only produce significantly more power than a temporally fixed turbine tuning if the array has a large number of turbine rows or a large local blockage ratio. For all cases considered, trends are consistent between the two turbine representations but the effects of local blockage and dynamic tuning are found to be much less significant for the more realistic tidal rotor than for the idealised actuator disc
first_indexed 2024-03-07T05:40:18Z
format Journal article
id oxford-uuid:e558e5ea-8bc2-45df-a105-713d4e82bf4e
institution University of Oxford
language English
last_indexed 2024-03-07T05:40:18Z
publishDate 2020
publisher American Society of Mechanical Engineers
record_format dspace
spelling oxford-uuid:e558e5ea-8bc2-45df-a105-713d4e82bf4e2022-03-27T10:23:21ZA note on the effects of local blockage and dynamic tuning on tidal turbine performanceJournal articlehttp://purl.org/coar/resource_type/c_dcae04bcuuid:e558e5ea-8bc2-45df-a105-713d4e82bf4eEnglishSymplectic ElementsAmerican Society of Mechanical Engineers2020Chen, LBonar, PAJVogel, CAdcock, TNumerical simulations are used to explore the potential for local blockage effects and dynamic tuning strategies to enhance the performance of turbines in tidal channels. Fulland partial-width arrays of turbines, modelled using the volume-flux-constrained actuator disc and blade element momentum theories, are embedded within a two-dimensional channel with a naturally low ratio of drag to inertial forces. For steady flow, the local blockage effect observed by varying the cross-stream spacing between the turbines is found to agree very well with the predictions of the two-scale actuator disc theory of Nishino and Willden (2012, “The efficiency of an array of tidal turbines partially blocking a wide channel”, J. Fluid Mech., vol. 708, pp. 596–606). For oscillatory flow, however, results show that, consistent with the findings of Bonar et al. (2019, “On the arrangement of tidal turbines in rough and oscillatory channel flow”, J. Fluid Mech., vol. 865, pp. 790–810), the shorter and more highly blocked arrays produce considerably more power than predicted by two-scale theory. Results also show that, consistent with the findings of Vennell (2016, “An optimal tuning strategy for tidal turbines”, Proc. R. Soc. A., vol. 472, p. 20160047), the ‘dynamic’ tuning strategy, in which the tuning of the turbines is varied over the tidal cycle, can only produce significantly more power than a temporally fixed turbine tuning if the array has a large number of turbine rows or a large local blockage ratio. For all cases considered, trends are consistent between the two turbine representations but the effects of local blockage and dynamic tuning are found to be much less significant for the more realistic tidal rotor than for the idealised actuator disc
spellingShingle Chen, L
Bonar, PAJ
Vogel, C
Adcock, T
A note on the effects of local blockage and dynamic tuning on tidal turbine performance
title A note on the effects of local blockage and dynamic tuning on tidal turbine performance
title_full A note on the effects of local blockage and dynamic tuning on tidal turbine performance
title_fullStr A note on the effects of local blockage and dynamic tuning on tidal turbine performance
title_full_unstemmed A note on the effects of local blockage and dynamic tuning on tidal turbine performance
title_short A note on the effects of local blockage and dynamic tuning on tidal turbine performance
title_sort note on the effects of local blockage and dynamic tuning on tidal turbine performance
work_keys_str_mv AT chenl anoteontheeffectsoflocalblockageanddynamictuningontidalturbineperformance
AT bonarpaj anoteontheeffectsoflocalblockageanddynamictuningontidalturbineperformance
AT vogelc anoteontheeffectsoflocalblockageanddynamictuningontidalturbineperformance
AT adcockt anoteontheeffectsoflocalblockageanddynamictuningontidalturbineperformance
AT chenl noteontheeffectsoflocalblockageanddynamictuningontidalturbineperformance
AT bonarpaj noteontheeffectsoflocalblockageanddynamictuningontidalturbineperformance
AT vogelc noteontheeffectsoflocalblockageanddynamictuningontidalturbineperformance
AT adcockt noteontheeffectsoflocalblockageanddynamictuningontidalturbineperformance