Fatigue assessment of a new concept for a floating barge with pendulum for offshore wind turbines in MOST

Abstract

Among floating foundations for offshore wind turbines, the barge is considered one of the most cost-effective platforms, owing to its ease of manufacturing, transport, and installation. However, the barge platform is susceptible to wave-induced stress due to its extensive waterplane area, potentially leading to fatigue in critical structural components such as the platform, tower, nacelle components and moorings. This paper delves into the prospect of mitigating fatigue damage in the barge concept by introducing a pendulum ballast, which can be installed at the offshore site using polyester ropes. The primary focus of this research is the assessment of the ‘barge-pendulum’ concept, aimed at reducing load cycles that could lead to fatigue failure, with a specific emphasis on the tower base as a representative indicator of device damage. The analysis is conducted using MOST, a time-domain simulation code developed in Matlab-Simscape environment. The findings show that the barge-pendulum concept has a poorer performance in terms of fatigue life, due to the increased sensitivity to wave forces.