Computational Modeling of a Regular Wave Tank

Abstract

This paper presents two different numerical methodologies to generate regular gravity waves in a wave tank. We performed numerical simulations of wave generation through the FLUENT® package, using the Volume of Fluid (VOF) multiphase model to reproduce the wave propagation in the tank. Thus it was possible to analyze two methods for generating regular waves that could be used in future work, especially in the study of devices of energy conversion from ocean waves into electrical energy.

3d Numerical Analysis About the Shape Influence of the Hydro-Pneumatic Chamber in an Oscillating Water Column (Owc)

“…The computational modeling presented was already verified and validated in Gomes et al (2009) and Seibt et al (2013), respectively, showing its effectiveness and accuracy for generating regular waves. Thus, for the sake of brevity, these procedures will not be reproduced here.…”

“…the turbine motion is independent of the fluid direction (Twidell and Weir, 2006). Several publications employing numerical techniques have been used to study the fluid dynamic behavior of the OWC device (Horko, 2007;Conde and Gato, 2008;Liu et al, 2008;Gomes et al, 2009;Grimmler et al 2012;Dos Santos et al, 2013). However there are few publications analyzing the influence of the OWC shape in its performance: Horko (2007) presents a numeric-experimental investigation about the front lip format, comparing five geometric possibilities and concluding that a rounded lip improves the efficiency of the OWC converter; Grimmler et al (2012), adopting a 3D numerical approach and by means of the Constructal Design method, studied an OWC having a hydropneumatic chamber with an hexahedral shape, aiming to maximize the mass flow rate of air passing through the chimney, obtaining a geometry with a performance 30% superior; Gomes et al (2012) also using the Constructal Design method but employing a 2D computational model studied the influence of the ratio between the height and length of a rectangular OWC chamber in its power, showing that the optimal shape can be ten times better if compared with the worst case; Isoldi et al (2013) used a 3D numerical model to compare the influence in the OWC performance of hydro-pneumatic chambers with different cross-sectional area format (rectangle, ellipse and diamond).…”

Computational modeling applied to the study of wave energy converters (WEC)

“…It is important to highlight that this numerical model, for the wave generation into a wave tank, was already verified and validated in Gomes et al (2009) and in Seibt et al (2014).…”

The Analysis of Fluid Dynamics of Wave Power Station With Wells Turbin by CFD

“…It was introduced in 1976 at Queen's University in Belfast some research into different aerodynamic blade profiles of the Wells turbine and modifications related to the airflow velocities [7][8][9]. A series of useful studies on OWC have been carried out by some authors from the application of the theory and boundary conditions to improve the properties and performance of OWC, the numerical model the flow was assumed to be inviscid, unsteady and incompressible were modeled in a NWT two-dimensional and k-ε turbulent model, where the Volume of Fluid (VOF) model were used [10][11][12][13][14][15][16][17]. ANSYS Fluent is a commercial software which solves the continuity and momentum Navier-Stokes equations based on the finite volume method.…”