• Journal of Korean Society of Coastal and Ocean Engineers
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• v.33 no.5
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• pp.195-202
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• 2021

Offshore wind turbine (OWT) receive a combined vertical-horizontal- moment load by wind, waves, and the structure's own weight. In this study, the bearing capacity for the combined load of the suction foundation of OWT installed on the sandy soil was calculated by finite element analysis. In addition, the stress state of the soil around the suction foundation was analyzed in detail under the condition that a combined load was applied. Based on the results of the analyses, new equations are proposed to calculate the horizontal and moment bearing capacities as well as to define the capacity envelopes under general combined loads.

• Transactions of the Korean hydrogen and new energy society
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• v.31 no.1
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• pp.160-168
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• 2020

Depending on the water depth and composition of seabed, there exist different alternatives for the wind turbine supporting structures. Among several types of the structures, the monopile foundation is the dominant solution for support structure, accounting for over 80% of the offshore wind turbines in Europe. To develop the monopile foundation suitable for domestic ocean environment, a basic design of a transition piece was carried out. This paper presents the design procedure of a flange connected transition piece and results of the structural safety assessment.

• KEPCO Journal on Electric Power and Energy
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• v.2 no.3
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• pp.469-475
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• 2016

As we are facing the shortage of oil energy, studies on renewable energy, wind energy research has been naturally getting attention. Among wind energies, ocean wind energy is relatively abundant compared to land wind energy and therefore, is getting much attention in terms of its efficiency. However, the problem is the cost. Generally, the cost ratio of the supporting structure is over 25% of the total installation cost of a offshore wind turbine system. Thus, it is very important to reduce the total installation cost of the offshore wind turbine and develop accurate analysis methodology for various offshore wind turbine foundations. In this study, nonlinear structure-soil interaction analyses have been proposed and conducted for the typical suction bucket model of an offshore wind turbine foundation, and the results were compared with experimental test data for numerical validations.

• KSCE Journal of Civil and Environmental Engineering Research
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• v.34 no.5
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• pp.1489-1504
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• 2014

This paper is aimed to suggest a site specific partial safety factor of offshore wind turbine (OWT) pile foundation design for the offshore wind turbine complex at a West-South mainland sea in Korea. International offshore wind design standards such as IEC, GL, DNV, API, ISO and EUROCODE were compared with each partial safety factor and resistance factor. Soil uncertainty analysis using a large number of soil data sampled was carried out, and their results were adapted to estimate partial safety factor of OWT pile foundation through reliability analyses. The representative partial safety factor has been estimated as 1.3. When a proposed partial factor is willing to use to other sites, it is recommended that further studies on code calibration are required to validate their accuracy using more site characterization data.

• Wind and Structures
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• v.25 no.5
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• pp.459-474
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• 2017

In this study an analytical expression is derived for the natural frequency of the wind turbine towers supported on flexible foundation. The derivation is based on a Euler-Bernoulli beam model where the foundation is represented by a stiffness matrix. Previously the natural frequency of such a model is obtained from numerical or empirical method. The new expression is based on pure physical parameters and thus can be used for a quick assessment of the natural frequencies of both the real turbines and the small-scale models. Furthermore, a relationship between the diagonal and non-diagonal element in the stiffness matrix is introduced, so that the foundation stiffness can be obtained from either the p-y analysis or the loading test. The results of the proposed expression are compared with the measured frequencies of six real or model turbines reported in the literature. The comparison shows that the proposed analytical expression predicts the natural frequency with reasonable accuracy. For two of the model turbines, some errors were observed which might be attributed to the difference between the dynamic and static modulus of saturated soils. The proposed analytical solution is quite simple to use, and it is shown to be more reasonable than the analytical and the empirical formulas available in the literature.

• Structural Engineering and Mechanics
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• v.88 no.3
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• pp.273-285
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• 2023

This study examines how the interaction between soil and a wind turbine's supporting system affects the optimal design. The supporting system resting on an elastic soil foundation consists of a steel conical tower and a concrete circular raft foundation, and it is subjected to wind loads. The material cost of the supporting system is aimed to be minimized employing various metaheuristic optimization algorithms including teaching-learning based optimization (TLBO). To include the influence of the soil in the optimization process, modified Vlasov and Gazetas elastic soil models are integrated into the optimization algorithms using the application programing interface (API) feature of the structural analysis program providing two-way data flow. As far as the optimal designs are considered, the best minimum cost design is achieved for the TLBO algorithm, and the modified Vlasov model makes the design economical compared with the simple Gazetas and infinitely rigid soil models. Especially, the optimum design dimensions of the raft foundation extremely reduce when the Vlasov realistic soil reactions are included in the optimum analysis. Additionally, as the designated design wind speed is decreased, the beneficial impact of soil interaction on the optimum material cost diminishes.

• Journal of Wind Energy
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• v.15 no.2
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• pp.23-36
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• 2024

In this study, a health monitoring system was developed for the two most vulnerable parts of a wind tower support structure: the connection between steel towers (L-Flange) and the concrete foundation-steel tower connection. To select assessment parameters for health monitoring, detailed FEM analysis was conducted using the ABAQUS program. Additionally, a testbed was established near the Jeju Woljeongri wind turbine farm to evaluate the applicability of measurement data by installing sensors. Through computational analysis and relevant criteria review, we defined limits for measurement parameters by vulnerable section. We categorized the structural safety evaluation into four stages: normal, caution, warning, and danger, and selected management criteria for each stage. From this, an algorithm to evaluate safety was developed, and a visualized monitoring platform based on the established critical parts monitoring system was developed.

• 한국신재생에너지학회:학술대회논문집
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• 2008.10a
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• pp.290-294
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• 2008

Offshore wind farms will contribute significantly to the renewable generation of electricity for the world. The economic development of wind farms depends, however, on development of efficient solutions to a number of technical issues, one of these being the foundations for the offshore turbines. We review here the results of recent research for wind turbine foundations. Also it is a short overview of some of the challenges facing the growth of offshore wind energy foundation technology.

• Journal of Advanced Marine Engineering and Technology
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• v.32 no.3
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• pp.413-420
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• 2008

In order to improve the performance of cross-flow hydro turbine, detailed examination of the effect of the turbine configuration on the performance is needed necessarily. Therefore, this study is aimed to investigate the effect of blade angle on the performance of the cross-flow hydro turbine. Analysis of the turbine performance with the variation of the blade angle has been made by using a commercial CFD code. The results show that inlet and outlet angles of runner blade give considerable effect on the performance of the turbine. Pressure on the surface of the runner blade changes remarkably by the blade angle both at the Stages 1 and 2. Moreover, relatively small blade inlet angle is effective to produce higher value of output power. Recirculating flow in the runner passage causes remarkable hydraulic loss.

• Journal of Korean Society of Coastal and Ocean Engineers
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• v.27 no.5
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• pp.339-344
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• 2015

Suction piles have been widely used as foundations and anchor systems in offshore industry, and recently, it have been tried to be used as foundations for offshore wind turbines. Many researches have shown that stiffness of a foundation could effect dynamic responses of a offshore wind turbine so that appropriate modeling application of wind turbine foundations is recommended. In this paper, we calculate a stiffness matrix of a suction foundation through 3D FEM analysis and compare the results with the ones calculated by conventional formula for estimating stiffness of shallow foundations. And then we carry out integrated load analysis for the evaluation of dynamic responses and natural frequencies of the structure using the calculated stiffness matrix. The results shows that the effect of load in the mudline is not large, but in the case of assuming the foundation as a fixed support, the natural frequency is over-estimated up to 10%. Therefore, considering stiffness of foundations is recommended when you evaluate the natural frequencies of wind turbine structures.