Sensitivity Analysis of a Bottom Fixed Offshore Wind Turbine Using the Environmental Contour Method

In the field of stochastic dynamics of marine structures, environmental conditions play a vital role. Considering wind and waves as random processes, determining the environmental parameters which correspond to an annual exceedance probability for a certain structural concept is of vital importance for the respective assessment of the loads and their effects. The accuracy in predicting the conditions, especially those corresponding to the sea, is of a great relevance when a probabilistic design is performed in order to ensure the structural integrity of an offshore wind turbine. In particular, models are not always completely perfect and accurate data is not always available. The Environmental Contour Method (ECM), which is based on the IFORM methodology, is one of the most popular methods in the offshore industry when determining the environmental conditions, for a given annual exceedance probability, is required. The ECM allows analysing proper sea states for operational and extreme conditions with lower computational efforts than the most accurate method (Full Long-Term Analysis). In the present study, effects of progressive variations (uncertainties) of the sea states parameters (i.e. significant wave height, spectral peak period) on the dynamic response of a Monopile Wind Turbine (NREL 5MW) are analysed. Two operative conditions are considered: rated wind and cut-out wind speed. In each case, the 50-year environmental contour (EC) is plotted for a site located in the North Sea. Some sea states are selected from the EC (base cases) and then derived cases with percentage variations are generated. All the cases are simulated in FAST (NREL) and the standard deviations of the time series are compared with its respective values of base cases. The results for the dynamic responses at mudline (e.g. overturning moments and shear forces) are presented as the most important parameters governing the design of the monopile. In this analysis, the wave height shows more influence on the response variation percentage than the peak period. This work shows the importance of accurately setting up the input parameters and their impact on the calculation of the dynamic responses.

Structural Safety Assessment of Marine Operations From a Long-Term Perspective: A Case Study of Offshore Wind Turbine Blade Installation

A marine operation is a complex non-routine activity of limited duration carried out in offshore environment. Due to safety reasons, these operations are normally performed within specific sea state limits, which are derived from numerical modelling and analysis of hazardous events. In view of the uncertainties in the assessment of structural responses under stochastic environmental conditions, these limiting curves correspond to a target structural failure probability recommended in offshore standards (for example, 10−4 per operation as specified by DNV-GL). However, one of the main limitations is that these curves do not reflect site-specific safety assessment. The current paper presents a novel methodology for assessing the structural safety level of marine operations from a long-term perspective. The methodology includes estimation of extreme response distribution under all possible operational sea states (i.e. the operational domain under the limiting sea states) for a given offshore site and is compared to the response limit to obtain an average failure probability. A case study is also presented for a blade root mating process onto preassembled hub using a jack-up crane vessel and risk of impact between root and hub is considered critical. Global time-domain simulations are performed using multibody dynamics, and extreme value distributions for impact velocities are derived for different wind-wave conditions. The allowable impact velocity between the blade root and the hub is determined by an explicit finite element analysis of the damage at the blade root. Finally, the average failure probabilities considering the operational domain are obtained for four different European offshore sites and are compared to the target level of structural failure probability considered for the limiting sea states.

Four-Point Bending of Metallic I-Core Sandwich Beams With Longitudinal Girder

I-core sandwich structure has great potential in the application of hull structure construction due to its high specific strength and relatively simple manufacturing process. The topic on the study of mechanical properties of I-core sandwich structure under bending loads is of interest to structural designers since the structure is often subjected to bending loads in engineering applications. In this paper, a metallic I-core sandwich beam with longitudinal girder was designed and manufactured using laser welding technique, and finally tested under four-point bend loading. The elastic-plastic behaviors and the ultimate load carrying capacity of this novel beam structure were obtained. A numerical model was developed to investigate the mechanical properties of this novel beam structure by finite element method. The results of the numerical model were compared with experimental data. Stress components of the front face and back face in the failure process were analyzed and discussed to investigate the failure of them. Results showed that the huge local bending stresses of plate caused the failure of the front face and back face. Finally, an improved scheme for the test was proposed to provide a pure bending load, which was proved by finite element simulation. All the findings aim to guide the engineering application of this structure.

Multiobjective Reliability-Based Design of Ship Structures Subjected to Fatigue Damage and Compressive Collapse

This work deals with reliability-based design and optimization of ship structures subjected to stochastic loads and accounting for the local fatigue damage and ultimate global strength. The reliability multi-objective structural optimization is performed in minimizing the structural component net-section area, lateral deflection and fatigue damage. The probability of compressive collapse and fatigue damage of the ship hull is used to define the minimum risk of structural collapse and best design solution. The Pareto frontier solutions calculated by the Non-Dominated Sorting Genetic Algorithm (NSGA-II) is employed in defining the feasible solutions of the design variables. The first order reliability method is employed to estimate the beta reliability index based on the topology of the structural component as a part of the Pareto frontier solutions. Comparing with the original design solution, the optimized section area decreased by 9%.

Random Combination Factors for Still Water and Wave Bending Moments

Based on the extreme value of the primary loads of ship hull girder instead of characteristic values, the more reasonable load combination factors are defined. In order to evaluate the random variation of newly defined load combination factors, based on Ferry-Berges & Castanheta (FBC) and Poisson square wave models, the still water bending moments (SWBM), vertical wave bending moments (VWBM) and their combined processes are simulated to get the random realizations of load combination factors. The statistical analysis results show that the load combination factors take the value of 1 with the highest probability and can be well fitted by the Weibull distribution. Such information should be incorporated appropriately in the reliability analysis of ship hull girder.

Dynamic Response of Metallic Y-Frame Core Sandwich Panels Subjected to Air Blast Loading: Numerical Investigation

In this paper, the dynamic response of metallic Y-frame core sandwich plates subjected to air blast loading was investigated by employing the LS-DYNA software. The blast wave was generated by the directly detonation of TNT explosives. The deformation/failure modes and associated structural response were identified and analyzed in detail. Main attention was paid to explore the effects of face sheet thicknesses and core web thickness on the deformation response of Y-frame core sandwich plates. A comparison on the blast performance were drawn among the Y-frame core sandwich panel, corrugated core sandwich panel and solid plate in equal areal mass. Numerical results revealed that the Y-frame core sandwich panel experienced indent deformation in the front face, strut buckling in the core and large bending deformation in the back face under the stand-off distance of 100 mm. Increasing the face sheets and core web thicknesses could improve the blast performance of Y-frame core sandwich panels. The deflections of face sheets were sensitive to the variation of front face sheet and core thicknesses. Moreover, Y-frame sandwich panel has comparable anti-blast capacity with the corrugated counterparts and exhibits superior blast resistance than the solid plate.

Two Parameter J-A Estimation for Weld Centerline Cracks in Welded Single-Edge Cracked Plate Under Tensile Loading

This work examines the J–A two-parameter characterization of elastic–plastic crack front fields for weld centerline cracks under tensile loading. Extensive finite element analyses (FEA) have been conducted to obtain solutions of constraint parameter A, which is the second parameter in a three-term elastic-plastic asymptotic expansion for the stress field near the tip of mode-I crack, for modified boundary layer (MBL) model and welded single-edge cracked plate (SECP). Solutions of the constraint parameter A were obtained for the material following the Ramberg-Osgood power law. The crack geometries analyzed include shallow and deep cracks, and remote tension loading levels cover from small-scale to large-scale yielding conditions. The effects of weld material mismatch and weld width on crack tip constraint were considered in the FEA. A constraint parameter AM, only caused by material strength mismatch, is defined and its parametric equation was obtained. The total constraint in the bi-material weldment can be predicted by adding together AM and A in the homogeneous material. Good agreements were achieved for welded SECP specimen with different crack size and weld width from small-scale to large-scale yielding conditions. This methodology would be useful for performing constraint-based elastic-plastic fracture analyses of other welded test specimens.

Effect of Spectrum Tail Length on Modulational Instability and Freak Wave Occurrence in JONSWAP Sea States

In this study, probability of freak wave occurrence due to modulational instability in JONSWAP sea states are investigated. This investigation has been conducted based on the quantitative indicators of instability in wave spectrum, which are two Benjamin-Feir index (BFI) [1,2] with different spectral bandwidth definitions and Π number [3]. Evolution of wave field are simulated using fully nonlinear phase-resolving Chalikov-Sheinin (CS) numerical model [4,5]. Initial sea surface is controlled with JONSWAP shape parameters (α and γ) and random initial phases. Effect of high frequency end of spectrum on modulational instability and freak wave evolution are discussed by considering 4 different tail lengths. According to simulation results, all parameters that are considered here perform as an indicator for the occurrence of extreme events which makes it possible to define a certain interval for indicators, where freak wave occurrence probability is the highest and potentially dangerous, to be possibly used in extreme wave forecasting. Another key finding is that, modulational instability increases when high frequency part of spectrum is present (longer tail) as expected. Nevertheless, after certain nonlinearity, modulational instability is more prone to result in breaking which significantly decreases the probability of occurrence of freak events. Therefore, spectra with shorter tail length result in more dangerous sea states.

Numerical Modelling of the Mooring Line Failure Induced Performance Changes of a Marine Fish Cage in Irregular Waves and Currents

This study aims to investigate the performance changes resulted from a mooring line failure of a marine fish cage exposed to irregular waves and current. A numerical model based on the lumped mass method and Morison equation was extended to simulate the mooring line failure scenario. In this study, the failed resulting changes were compared with its normal counterpart in both the time domain and the frequency domain. After one upstream anchor loss, the maximum tension on the remaining anchor has increased significantly, as well as the drift distance of the rearing part (net chamber, floating collar, and tube-sinker) of the fish cage. The resulting changes can also be seen in both the wave-frequency and the low-frequency region in the spectra, including mooring tensions and body motions.

Experimental Assessment of Form Based Approach for Predicting Extreme Value Distribution of Hull Girder Bending Moment in a Ship

This paper describes a series of towing tank tests using a scaled model of a recent container ship for validating the First Order Reliability Method (FORM) based approach to predict the maximum response. The FORM based approach is adopted in conjunction with the nonlinear strip method as an estimation method for the most probable wave episodes (MPWEs) leading to the given extreme wave-induced vertical bending moments (VBMs). Tank tests under the pre-determined MPWEs are conducted to evaluate the extreme wave-induced VBMs. Numerical simulations based on the coupled Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) and Finite Element Analysis (FEA) are also conducted and are compared with the test results under the MPWEs. Furthermore, to estimate the extreme VBM statistics, tank tests under random irregular waves are conducted. A series of validations of the probability of exceedances (PoEs) of the VBM evaluated from the FORM based approach is carried out. The effect of hydroelastic (whipping) vibrations on the extreme VBM statistics are finally discussed.