A numerical investigation of tsunamis impacting dams

Wave-induced dynamic pressure under rubble mound breakwaters with submerged berm: an experimental and numerical study

Fully-coupled hydroelastic modelling of a deformable wall in waves

The Oscillating Water Column (OWC) device is one of many available technologies for generating electricity from water waves. It is a caisson-like structure, which houses a water column in an enclosed chamber with an inlet at the bottom. Waves enter the device, exciting the water column. The trapped air above is forced out through a turbine, generating electricity. The technology is relatively young compared to other sources of renewable energy, such as solar or wind energy. This makes the produced energy expensive, expressed in the Levelised Cost of Energy (LCOE). Integrating devices into breakwaters already resulted in a large reduction of the costs, as they now can be shared. During the design of such devices, main attention is given to the geometrical design. This should be based on local wave conditions to ensure the largest energy production. Having the eigenperiod match with the incident wave period enhances the resonance effect in the chamber. This research explores the potential to reduce the costs of OWC devices integrated in breakwaters through means of structural optimisation. The structural are built quite robust, leaving the thought there is room for improvement. The device in Civitavecchia, Italy was used as a case study. A new method was adopted to investigate the potential. A numerical model was constructed in STAR-CCM+, including both a fluid domain and a solid domain. The two are one-way coupled, from water to structure. The exerted wave pressures are mapped on the structure directly, resulting in a stress state in the OWC structure. Due to the transient nature of the simulations, all results are available through time. It was found, the main walls shaping the OWC device could be built with 35% less material. Variants of the original geometry were tested as well to see how these influence the results. Furthermore, the structural behaviour was investigated. Clear trends were found in position and timing of governing load combinations in the different walls. One of the most important findings was that the governing load case always was in the direction of the transverse width. The walls were found to behave more like beams in this direction. The bending moments could therefore easily be calculated using standard beam equations and the net horizontal pressure on the wall as load. This leads to the beginning of a new simplified design method where the full numerical structural analysis is not required anymore.

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Structural Optimisation and Behaviour of the Breakwater Integrated Oscillating Water Column Device. A combined 3D CFD and Structural FEM Analysis.

A Bayesian inverse dynamic approach for impulsive wave loading reconstruction: Theory, laboratory and field application

Several failures of recurved concrete crownwalls have been observed in recent years. This work aims to get a better insight within the processes underlying the loading phase of these structures due to non-breaking wave impulsive loading conditions and to identify the dominant failure modes. The investigation is carried out through an offline one-way coupling of computational fluid dynamics (CFD) generated wave pressure time series and a time-varying structural Finite Element Analysis. The recent failure of the Civitavecchia (Italy) recurved parapet is adopted as an explanatory case study. Modal analysis aimed to identify the main modal parameters such as natural frequencies, modal masses and modal shapes is firstly performed to comprehensively describe the dynamic response of the investigated structure. Following, the CFD generated pressure field time-series is applied to linear and non-linear finite element model, the developed maximum stresses and the development of cracks are properly captured in both models. Three non-linear analyses are performed in order to investigate the performance of the crownwall concrete class. Starting with higher quality concrete class, it is decreased until the formation of cracks is reached under the action of the same regular wave condition. It is indeed shown that the concrete quality plays a dominant role for the survivability of the structure, even allowing the design of a recurved concrete parapet without reinforcing steel bars.

Gerd-Jan Schreppers

Papers

Crownwall Failure Analysis through Finite Element Method