Abstract
Numerical models have been widely used for the resource characterization and assessment of tidal instream energy. The accurate assessment of tidal stream energy resources at a feasibility or project-design scale requires detailed hydrodynamic model simulations or high-quality field measurements. This study applied a three-dimensional finite-volume community ocean model (FVCOM) to simulate the tidal hydrodynamics in the Passamaquoddy–Cobscook Bay archipelago, with a focus on the Western Passage, to assist tidal energy resource assessment. IEC Technical specifications were considered in the model configurations and simulations. The model was calibrated and validated with field measurements. Energy fluxes and power densities along selected cross sections were calculated to evaluate the feasibility of the tidal energy development at several hotspots that feature strong currents. When taking both the high current speed and water depth into account, the model results showed that the Western Passage has great potential for the deployment of tidal energy farms. The maximum extractable power in the Western Passage was estimated using the Garrett and Cummins method. Different criteria and methods recommended by the IEC for resource characterization were evaluated and discussed using a sensitivity analysis of energy extraction for a hypothetical tidal turbine farm in the Western Passage.
Highlights
Instream tidal energy is one of the most popular marine renewable energy sources because it is highly predictable and the associated technology is relatively mature [1,2,3,4]
Significant efforts have been made to assess the maximum potential of tidal stream energy at a system-wide scale using theoretical methods or numerical models [5,6,7,8,9,10,11,12], the accurate assessment of tidal energy resources at the project-design scale requires detailed tidal hydrodynamic information obtained from intense field measurements [13,14,15] and high-resolution simulations using three-dimensional (3-D) numerical models [16,17,18,19,20,21]
This study presents a modeling effort conducted to assess the tidal energy resources at a highly energetic site—the Western Passage [12,34]—using a high-resolution hydrodynamic model
Summary
Instream tidal energy is one of the most popular marine renewable energy sources because it is highly predictable and the associated technology is relatively mature [1,2,3,4]. The International Electrotechnical Commission (IEC) Technical Specification (TS) recommends that tidal resource characterization be conducted based on detailed and accurate hydrodynamic information, which can be obtained from either direct field measurements or hydrodynamic modeling [27]. A previous modeling study was carried out to evaluate the efficiency of energy extraction in the Western Passage in the U.S state of Maine [28] This model was validated with limited measured data, and the theoretical resources in the Western Passage were not assessed. A sensitivity analysis with energy extraction from a tidal turbine farm was conducted to demonstrate the advantage of using numerical modeling to support tidal energy resource assessment by providing essential information
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