PFI-TT: Advancing the Technology Readiness of Pylon Fairings for Tidal Turbines

该创新-技术转化伙伴关系（PFI-TT）项目的更广泛影响/商业潜力是重新设计和测试潮汐涡轮机的关键部件（塔架）以产生能量。 一个不影响水流的塔架将增加能源生产，并需要更少的能源来运行。 这也将增加涡轮机的操作寿命。 该项目将进行实验室实验，模拟海洋能源部署地点的条件，以评估最佳设计。 在各种流动条件下从这些测试中获得的知识可以应用于海洋可再生能源行业及其他行业的许多结构。 除了科学发现，教育目标强调PI致力于发展研究生和博士后的创业和领导技能。计划中的教育活动包括积极参与海洋能源行业的导师，以及通过内部项目进行为期一周的高度沉浸式创业体验。拟议项目将评估修改后的塔架，其中包括塔架后面的直板，凸板和凹板组成的整流罩。整流罩通过改变塔尾流中的分离线以及剪切层和卷吸层来影响下游流场。这导致流向下游转子的清洁流，从而最大限度地减少转子盘处的速度降低和流入角变化。 我们提出了协同实验和计算研究，以评估在三个不同的湍流强度水平，模仿潜在的潮汐能部署地点的特性的塔架整流罩。PI开发的主动网格湍流发生器将用于在实验室实验中创建升高的湍流条件。此外，还将进行计算流体动力学研究，以解决缩放问题，即，实验室实验如何映射到开发商现场的全尺寸塔架。整个数据库将提供给海洋可再生能源行业和其他海洋相关行业，以应对涡旋脱落的后果。该奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的知识价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

The broader impact/commercial potential of this Partnerships for Innovation - Technology Translation (PFI-TT) project is to redesign and test a key component (the pylon) of a tidal turbine to generate energy. A pylon that doesn't affect the flow would increase energy production and would require less energy to run. This would also increase the operational lifetime of the turbine. This project will conduct laboratory experiments to mimic the conditions of a marine energy deployment site in order to evaluate the best design. The knowledge acquired from these tests under a variety of flow conditions could be applied to numerous structures in the marine renewable energy industry and beyond. In addition to the scientific discoveries, the educational goal underlines the PI's commitment to developing the entrepreneurial and leadership skills of graduate students and post-docs. Planned educational initiatives include active engagement with mentors from the marine energy industry and a highly immersive week-long entrepreneurship experience through an in-house program.The proposed project will evaluate modified pylons that would include fairings composed of straight, convex, and concave plates behind the pylon. The fairings affect the downstream flow by altering separation lines as well as the shear layer and the entrainment layer in the wake of the pylon. This leads to a clean flow to the downstream rotor, minimizing the velocity reduction at the rotor disk and inflow angular variations. We propose synergistic experimental and computational studies to evaluate pylon fairings at three different turbulence intensity levels that mimic the characteristic of potential tidal energy deployment sites. An active grid turbulence generator developed by the PI will be used to create elevated turbulence conditions in laboratory experiments. In addition, computational fluid dynamics studies would also be conducted to address the scaling issue - i.e., how the laboratory experiments would map to the full-scale pylon at the developer's site. The entire database will be made available to the marine renewable energy industry and other marine-related industries that contend with the consequences of vortex shedding.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.