Abstract
This work presents a modular floating structure, which consists of five inner tension-leg platforms and two outermost wave energy converters (denoted as MTLPW). The hydrodynamic interaction effect and the mechanical coupling effect between the five inner tension-leg platforms (TLP) and the two outermost wave energy converters (WEC) are taken into consideration. The effects of the connection modes and power take-off (PTO) parameters of the WECs on the hydrodynamic performance of the MTLPW system are investigated under both operational and extreme sea conditions. The results indicate that the hydrodynamic responses of the MTLPW system are sensitive to the connection type of the outermost WECs. The extreme responses of the bending moment of connectors depend on the number of continuously fixed modules. By properly utilizing hinge-type connectors to optimize the connection mode for the MTLPW system, the effect of more inner TLP modules on the hydrodynamic responses of the MTLPW system can be limited to be acceptable. Therefore, the MTLPW system can be potentially expanded to a large degree.
Highlights
The surge response is usually the most significant motion of the tension-leg platforms (TLP) module [34,35,36], while the heave and pitch responses are both important for the outermost wave energy converters (WEC) modules
The corresponding motion responses of the seven-module MTLPW system are shown in Figure 5, and the amplitudes of the connectors’
This paper proposes a modular floating structure with inner tension-leg platforms and outermost wave energy converters
Summary
Publisher’s Note: MDPI stays neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations. A nonlinear dynamic network model for the modular VLFS has been proposed, which can account for different nonlinear effects such as sudden changes of module responses [21], amplitude death [22,23,24], and collective behaviors [25]. The availability of this nonlinear numerical model has been verified by corresponding model tests [26]. The effects of different connection modes and WECs’ PTO parameters on the hydrodynamic performance of the proposed system are investigated
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