About the project
Principal Investigator: Dr Pál Schmitt
HDTide will demonstrate two novel approaches to the challenge facing the marine energy sector in obtaining high temporal and spatial flow field data and thus advance insight and confidence in power and load assessment, wake recovery modelling and array layout choice for tidal energy converters.
Recent academic research has provided the most detailed and highest quality data to date of turbine blade loading and power output for varying turbulence levels and waves in a lab environment. A related international blind test supported by the Supergen ORE Hub of numerical design tools proved the high fidelity of such tools. However, detailed field studies of tidal turbines are still relatively scarce, and scant flow characterisation makes it difficult to understand or replicate real operating conditions. In the wind industry, Lidar has become the method of choice to obtain large scale, high resolution data of wind fields. In energetic offshore conditions, Active Acoustic Sensors have become the method of choice for the tidal energy industry. But since they provide either high temporal resolution point data (ADV) or velocity profiles which are averaged over too large a volume (ADP) both solutions lack capability. In this work, researchers will demonstrate two cost-effective, independent methods of gaining vital flow field data at the required spatiotemporal resolution for reliable turbine design and load calculations.
