Study On Hydrodynamic Performance Of Horizontal Marine Current Turbine

The horizontal marine current turbine is an important form of marine power generation machinery, which is still in its early stages of study. In this paper, first, the combination of linear-vorticity stream function panel method with blade element moment method was adopted to predict the hydrodynamic performance of foil profile and to check the load of marine current turbine. Second, the full three dimensional viscous numerical method was adopted to predict the hydrodynamic performance of single turbine and dual turbines in tandem arrangement. The effect of marine velocity boundary layer, the effect of wave and the performance of cavitation were also considered.The results of simulation were shown as follows. The combination of linear-vorticity stream function panel method with blade element moment method was able to predict the hydrodynamic performance of foil profile and do preliminary design for marine current turbine effectively. Both LES math model and SA turbulent model can predict the hydrodynamic performance well in the design condition. The effect of distance is significance and the effect of initial phase difference is slight for the output performance of dual turbines in tandem arrangement. To keep the performance of dual turbines in tandem arrangement, 30 times diameter distance is needed. The hydrodynamic performance will change periodically as the result of marine velocity boundary layer, whose frequency is consistent with the turbine rotation frequency. The hydrodynamic performance will also change periodically as the result of wave, whose frequency characteristic depends on both the wave frequency and the rotation frequency. Both the incipient cavitation number and the cavity shape of simulation are consistent with experiments.The conclusions presented above are important for the optimum design and safe operation of marine current turbine. The experience of application three dimensional viscous numerical method provides a reference for the research of marine power generation machinery.