Modified Inverse First Order Reliability Method (I-FORM) for Predicting Extreme Sea States.

Technical Report · Mon Sep 01 04:00:00 EDT 2014

DOI:https://doi.org/10.2172/1157595· OSTI ID:1157595

Eckert-Gallup, Aubrey Celia; Sallaberry, Cedric Jean-Marie; Dallman, Ann Renee; Neary, Vincent Sinclair

Environmental contours describing extreme sea states are generated as the input for numerical or physical model simulation s as a part of the stand ard current practice for designing marine structure s to survive extreme sea states. Such environmental contours are characterized by combinations of significant wave height ( ) and energy period ( ) values calculated for a given recurrence interval using a set of data based on hindcast simulations or buoy observations over a sufficient period of record. The use of the inverse first - order reliability method (IFORM) i s standard design practice for generating environmental contours. In this paper, the traditional appli cation of the IFORM to generating environmental contours representing extreme sea states is described in detail and its merits and drawbacks are assessed. The application of additional methods for analyzing sea state data including the use of principal component analysis (PCA) to create an uncorrelated representation of the data under consideration is proposed. A reexamination of the components of the IFORM application to the problem at hand including the use of new distribution fitting techniques are shown to contribute to the development of more accurate a nd reasonable representations of extreme sea states for use in survivability analysis for marine struc tures. Keywords: In verse FORM, Principal Component Analysis , Environmental Contours, Extreme Sea State Characteri zation, Wave Energy Converters

• Research Organization: Sandia National Laboratories (SNL-NM), Albuquerque, NM (United States)
• Sponsoring Organization: USDOE Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy (EERE)
• DOE Contract Number: AC04-94AL85000
• OSTI ID: 1157595
• Report Number(s): SAND2014-17550; 537505
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English