Reliability based Design Optimisation of Floating Offshore Wind Turbine Support Structures

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The vast majority of offshore wind resources are located in deep water regions. As the conventional offshore wind technology is restricted to shallow waters, there is a need for developing floating wind turbines (FWTs) that enables using this vast amount of energy.Floating offshore wind energy technology is in early-stage development. One of the largest barriers to further development of FWTs is their greater cost relative to bottom-fixed offshore wind turbines. One way to lower the cost of FWT technologies is through the increased reliability (i.e. reduced probability of failure) of FWT support structures, which are exposed to the harsh marine environment with great uncertainties in wind, wave and current loads.This PhD project will look into the improvement of reliability and the reduction of cost of FWT support structures, through the development of an efficient and robust reliability-based design and optimisation framework that is capable of efficiently and robustly achieving optimal design to meet target reliability.