Dalhousie University

Purpose

The objective of this project is to model and test hydrokinetic turbines to determine local and time-variant turbine blade loads. This model will be applied to determine blade loading and turbine interaction to real-life cases, proving its usefulness as an engineering design tool. Ultimately, this validated numerical method will be used to study the load behaviour on turbine blades as a function of various parameters (type of tidal flow, turbine design, turbine arrangement in an array, etc.) to extract a body of knowledge useful for engineers. The knowledge of spatio-temporal load variations is the starting point of material fatigue studies which will narrow down the estimated lifetime of turbine blades while in operation. Such knowledge will have a great impact on risk assessment and overall system operation cost.