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Modal dynamics and flutter analysis of floating offshore vertical axis wind turbines

Journal Article · · Renewable Energy
 [1];  [2];  [2]
  1. Univ. of Texas at Dallas, Richardson, TX (United States); OSTI
  2. Univ. of Texas at Dallas, Richardson, TX (United States)

Floating platforms provide vertical axis wind turbines (VAWTs) significant advantages over offshore horizontal axis wind turbines, which has led to increased research interest in offshore VAWT technology. Here, this paper examines dynamic stability of floating VAWTs and presents structural dynamic and aero-elastic flutter analysis of utility-scale 5 MW floating VAWTs by coupling a rotor finite element model with a linearized model for the floating system. The coupled floating VAWT model is utilized to study the effects of tower height, number of blades, blade tapering scheme, and impacts of the floating platform on modal properties and flutter. The study provides important new results and guidance to floating VAWT designers: (1) tower height increase leads to lower tower frequencies more prone to resonance, (2) by moving from land-based foundations to a floating TLP foundation, tower-mode frequency is increased significantly (by 49%–68%) which mitigates resonance and increases the flutter RPM (154% increase), (3) increasing the number of blades reduces the tower mode frequencies for both land-based and floating configuration, and (4) blade chord tapering can have a significant impact on increasing the tower mode flutter RPM. Further, analysis of low-frequency rigid body modes shows a safe, higher flutter RPM relative to the operating RPM.

Research Organization:
Univ. of Texas at Dallas, Richardson, TX (United States)
Sponsoring Organization:
USDOE Advanced Research Projects Agency - Energy (ARPA-E)
Grant/Contract Number:
AR0001179
OSTI ID:
1977603
Alternate ID(s):
OSTI ID: 1839096
Journal Information:
Renewable Energy, Journal Name: Renewable Energy Journal Issue: C Vol. 185; ISSN 0960-1481
Publisher:
ElsevierCopyright Statement
Country of Publication:
United States
Language:
English

References (5)

Aeroelastic stability predictions for a MW-sized blade journal July 2004
On the structural response of two‐ and three‐bladed vertical axis wind turbines journal February 2020
Aeroelastic instability problems for wind turbines journal January 2007
Operational modal analysis on a VAWT in a large wind tunnel using stereo vision technique journal April 2017
Resonances and Aerodynamic Damping of a Vertical Axis Wind Turbine journal June 2012

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