ANALYTICAL RESEARCH ON THE WAVE DIFFRACTION OF ARC-SHAPED FLOATING BREAKWATERS

An analytical method was developed to study the wave diffraction on are-shaped floating breakwaters. The floating breakwater was assumed to be rigid, thin, vertical, immovable and located in water of constant depth. The fluid domain was divided into two regions by imaginary interface, The velocity potential in each region is expanded by eigenfunctions. By satisfying continuity of pressure and normal velocity across the imaginary fluid interface, a set of linear algebraic equations could be obtained to determine the unknown coefficients for eigenfunctions. The accuracy of present model and the computer program were verified by a comparison with ex isting results for the case of arc-shaped bottom-mounted breakwaters. Numerical results, in the form of contour maps of the non-dimension wave amplitude around the breakwater, were presented for a range of wave and breakwater parame ters. Results show the wave diffraction on the arc-shaped floating breakwater is related to the incident wavelength and the draft of the breakwater.

Wave Diffraction on Arc-Shaped Floating Perforated Breakwaters

An analytical method is developed to study the sheltering effects on arc-shaped floating perforated breakwaters. In the process of analysis, the tloating breakwater is assumed to be rigid, thin, vertical, and immovable and located in water with constant depth. The fluid domain is divided into two regions by imaginary interface. The velocity potential in each region is expanded by eigenfunction in the context of linear theory. By satisfying continuity of pressure and normal velocity across the imaginary fluid interface, a set of linear algebraic equations can be obtained to determine the unknown coefficients for eigenfunction expansions. The accuracy of the present model was verified by a comparison with existing results for the case of arc-shaped floating breakwater. Numerical results, in the form of contour maps of the non-dimensional wave amplitude around the breakwater and diffracted wave amplitude at typical sections, are presented for a range of wave and breakwater parameters. Results show that the sheltering effects on the arc-shaped floating perforated breakwater are closely related to the incident wavelength, the draft and the porosity of the breakwater.

Scattering of Water Waves by Dual Symmetric Inclined Floating Porous Barriers Using the DBEM

The scattering of normally incident water waves by two surface-piercing inclined perforated barriers in water with a uniform finite depth is investigated within the framework of linear water wave theory.Considering that thin barriers are zero-thickness,a novel numerical method involving the the coupling of the dual boundary element method(DBEM)with damping layers is applied.In order to effectively damp out the reflected waves,two damping layers,instead of pseudoboundaries are implemented near the two side boundaries of the computational domain.Thus,the modified linearized free surface boundary conditions are formulated and used for solving both the ordinary boundary integral equation as well as the hypersingular boundary integral equation for degenerate boundaries.The newly developed numerical method is validated against analytical methods using the matched eigenfunction expansion method for the special case of two vertical barriers or the inclined angle to the vertical being zero.The influence of the length of the two damping layers has been discussed.Moreover,these findings are also validated against previous results for several cases.After validation,the numerical results for the reflection coefficient,transmission coefficient and dissipation coefficient are obtained by varying the inclination angle and porosity-effect parameter.The effects of both the inclination angle and the porosity on the amplitudes of wave forces acting on both the front and rear barriers are also investigated.It is found that the effect of the inclination angle mainly shifts the location of the extremal values of the reflection and the transmission coefficients.Additionally,a moderate value of the porosity-parameter is quite effective at dissipating wave energy and mitigating the wave loads on dual barriers.

Effect of Under Connected Plates on the Hydrodynamic Efficiency of the Floating Breakwater

In this paper, the hydrodynamic efficiency of a floating breakwater system is experimentally studied by use of physical models. Regular waves with wide ranges of wave heights and periods are tested. The efficiency of the breakwater is presented as a function of the wave transmission, reflection, and energy dissipation coefficients. Different parameters affecting the breakwater efficiency are investigated, e.g. the number of the under connected vertical plates, the length of the mooring wire, and the wave length. It is found that, the transmission coefficient kt decreases with the increase of the relative breakwater width B/L, the number of plates n and the relative wire length l/h, while the reflection coefficient kr takes the opposite trend. Therefore, it is possible to achieve kt values smaller than 0.25 and kr values larger than 0.80 when B/L is larger than 0.25 for the case of l/h-1.5 and n=4. In addition, empirical equations used for estimating the transmission and reflection coefficients are developed by using the dimensionless analysis, regression analysis and measured data and verified by different theoretical and experimental results.

Experimental Study of A Pile-Restrained Floating Breakwater Constructed of Pontoon and Plates

A pile-restrained pontoon-plate floating breakwater is proposed in this paper. The laboratory physical-model tests are conducted to investigate the wave-dissipation property and heave-motion response of a model. The influence of the model＇s geometric parameters including relative pontoon width, plate width, number of plates and pontoon draft on wavedissipation performance and heave-motion response are discussed, as well as the correlation between these two factors. The result indicates that wave-dissipation performance of the proposed structure is better than the pontoon structure： its transmission coefficient and heave-motion height are reduced by 0.2 and 0.3, respectively, in comparison with those of the pile-restrained pontoon model at a relative pontoon width of 0.2.

Numerical and Experimental Investigation of Interactions Between Free-Surface Waves and A Floating Breakwater with Cylindrical-Dual/Rectangular-Single Pontoon

This paper investigates the hydrodynamic performance of a cylindrical-dual or rectangular-single pontoon floating breakwater using the numerical method and experimental study. The numerical simulation work is based on the multi-physics computational fluid dynamics(CFD) code and an innovative full-structured dynamic grid method applied to update the three-degree-of-freedom(3-DOF) rigid structure motions. As a time-marching scheme, the trapezoid analogue integral method is used to update the time integration combined with remeshing at each time step.The application of full-structured mesh elements can prevent grids distortion or deformation caused by large-scale movement and improve the stability of calculation. In movable regions, each moving zone is specified with particular motion modes(sway, heave and roll). A series of experimental studies are carried out to validate the performance of the floating body and verify the accuracy of the proposed numerical model. The results are systematically assessed in terms of wave coefficients, mooring line forces, velocity streamlines and the 3-DOF motions of the floating breakwater. When compared with the wave coefficient solutions, excellent agreements are achieved between the computed and experimental data, except in the vicinity of resonant frequency. The velocity streamlines and wave profile movement in the fluid field can also be reproduced using this numerical model.

Experimental Study of Wave Attenuation in Trapezoidal Floating Breakwaters

A comprehensive experimental study was carried out on the regular wave attenuation with a trapezoidal pontoontype floating breakwater(FB) in deep water. The functionalities of two simple FB geometries consist of a rectangle and a trapezoid with the slope of 60° were investigated under the wave attack. A two-dimensional wave flume was used in the experiment; the incident, transmitted waves, mooring line forces and motion responses of the floating breakwaters were measured. Also the influence of the sea state conditions(incident wave height and wave period)and structural parameters(draught of the structure) were investigated using the trapezoidal FB. Our experimental results indicated that the trapezoidal FB significantly reduced the wave transmission and mooring line force when compared with rectangular FBs. A new formula was developed in order to predict the value of the transmission coefficient in trapezoidal FBs with the slope of 60°. Experimental data showed to be consistent with the results of the formula.

Study on Submerged Upper Arc-Shaped Plate Type Breakwater

Based on the wave radiation and diffraction theory, this paper investigates a new type breakwater with upper arcshaped plate by using the boundary element method(BEM). By comparing with other three designs of plate type breakwater(lower arc-shaped plate, single horizontal plate and double horizontal plate), this new type breakwater has been proved more effective. The wave exiting force, transmission and reflection coefficients are analyzed and discussed. In order to reveal the wave elimination mechanism of this type of breakwater, the velocity field around the breakwater is obtained. It is shown that:(1) The sway exciting force is minimal.(2) When the ratio of the submergence and wave amplitude is 0.05, the wave elimination effect will increase by 50% compared with other three types of breakwater.(3) The obvious backflow is found above the plate in the velocity field analysis.

Time-domain hydrodynamic analysis of pontoon-plate floating breakwater

The hydrodynamic behaviors of a floating breakwater consisting of a rectangular pontoon and horizontal plates are studied theoretically. The fluid motion is idealized as two-dimensional linear potential flow. The motions of the floating breakwater are assumed to be two-dimensional in sway, heave, and roll. The solution to the fluid motion is derived by transforming the governing differential equation into the integral equation on the boundary in time domain with the Green＇s function method. The motion equations of the floating breakwater are established and solved with the fourth-order Runge-Kutta method to obtain the displacement and velocity of the breakwater. The mooring forces are computed with the static method. The computational results of the wave transmission coefficient, the motion responses, and the mooring forces of the pontoon-plate floating breakwater are given. It is indicated that the relative width of the pontoon is an important factor influencing the wave transmission coefficient of the floating breakwater. The transmission coefficient decreases obviously as the relative width of the pontoon increases. The horizontal plates help to reduce the wave transmission over the floating breakwater. The motion responses and the mooring forces of the pontoon-plate floating breakwater are less than those of the pontoon floating breakwater. The mooring force at the offshore side is larger than that at the onshore side.

Experimental Research on A New Type of Floating Breakwater for Wave-Absorbing and Energy-Capturing

To avoid the damage caused by big wind and wave in cage culture, and to solve the problem of energy supply faced by automatic breeding equipment, a new type of floating breakwater, named as Savonius double buoy breakwater(SDBB), is proposed in the paper. The floating breakwater is composed of HDPE cylindrical double buoys and horizontal axis Savonius rotors, and has the functions of wave-absorbing and energy-capturing. Based on the linear wave theory and energy conservation law, the Fourier Transform was applied to separate the two-dimensional wave frequency domain, and the energy captured by the rotors and absorbed by the floating breakwater were calculated.Experiments were conducted in a two-dimensional wave-making flume, and the transmitted waves at different wave heights and periods, the tension of mooring lines, and the rotational torque exerted on the Savonius rotor were measured. A series of performance comparison tests were also performed on the new floating breakwater and the traditional double-floating breakwater. Results show that the new floating breakwater is better than the traditional one in terms of reducing wave transmittance, and the combination of the floating breakwater with Savonius rotors can provide for marine aquaculture equipments with green power supply to a certain degree of self-sufficiency.

Experimental Study on Rectangular Floating Breakwaters

This paper proposes ten types of improved floating breakwaters for experiment with regular waves, based on the experience in the development and manufacture of existing floating breakwaters both at home and abroad, and on the results of experimental studies on the hydraulic characteristics of several types of floating breakwaters. The wave heights before and behind the breakwaters are measured, the movements of floating breakwaters are observed and the chain forces of the floating breakwaters are measured. The paper studies and compares the hydraulic characteristics of the improved rectangular floating breakwaters of which the internal and external structures and their installation methods are changed. Finally the optimal type of structure is selected through experiments.

Wave Pressure Acting on V-Shaped Floating Breakwater in Random Seas

Wave pressure on the wet surface of a V-shaped floating breakwater in random seas is investigated. Considering the diffraction effect, the unit velocity potential caused by the single regular waves around the breakwater is solved using the finite-depth Green function and boundary element method, in which the Green function is solved by integral method. The Response-Amplitude Operator(RAO) of wave pressure is acquired according to the Longuet-Higgins' wave model and the linear Bernoulli equation. Furthermore, the wave pressure's response spectrum is calculated according to the wave spectrum by discretizing the frequency domain. The wave pressure's characteristic value corresponding to certain cumulative probability is determined according to the Rayleigh distribution of wave heights. The numerical results and field test results are compared, which indicates that the wave pressure calculated in random seas agrees with that of field measurements. It is found that the bigger angle between legs will cause the bigger pressure response, while the increase in leg length does not influence the pressure significantly. The pressure at the side of head sea is larger than that of back waves. When the incident wave angle changes from 0? to 90?, the pressure at the side of back waves decreases clearly, while at the side of head sea, the situation is more complicated and there seems no obvious tendency. The concentration of wave energy around low frequency(long wavelength) will induce bigger wave pressure, and more attention should be paid to this situation for the structure safety.

Theoretical Calculation of Floating Breakwater Performance

In this paper, the theoretical calculation of floating breakwater performance in regular waves with arbitrary wave direction is discussed. Under the hypothesis of linearized system and applying the strip theory, we can solve the boundary condition problems of diffraction potential and radiation potential. Introducing the asymptotic expression of the wave velocity potential at infinity and using wave energy conservation, we can separately calculate the transmitted waves generated by the sway, heave and roll motion of the floating breakwater and by the fixed breakwater. Finally, we define the amplitude ratio of the transmitted wave to the incident wave as the transmitted wave coefficient CT which describes the floating breakwater effectiveness. Two examples are given and the theoretical results obtained by the present method agree well with experimental results.

Study on Performance of Savonius Rotor Type Wave Energy Converter Used in Conjunction with Floating Breakwater

In the present study,the performance characteristics of a Savonius rotor type wave energy converter used in conjunction with a conventional double-buoy floating breakwater is investigated using physical model studies.The Savonius rotor type converter is suspended under the double-buoy floating breakwater to achieve wave attenuation while generating electricity,thereby enhancing the overall wave-elimination effect of the combination.The Savonius rotor is tested with different water submergence depths,and a reasonable relative submergence depth is determined within the scope of the research parameters.The hydrodynamics and energy capture performance of the combined breakwater with four different sizes of Savonius rotor under different wave conditions are studied,and the transmission coefficient of the experimental device is analyzed.The results show that when the optimal relative submergence depth is 0.65D,where D is the impeller diameter,there is a correspondence between the optimal performance of Savonius rotor with different rotor sizes and the wave period and wave height.The optimal energy capture efficiency of the wave energy converter reaches 17%−20.5%,and the transmission coefficient is reduced by 35%−45%compared with the conventional double-buoy breakwater.

Comparison of Hydrodynamic Performances Between Single Pontoon and Double Pontoon Floating Breakwaters Through the SPH Method

A numerical study adopting the 2Dδ-SPH model is performed to compare the hydrodynamic characteristics of a single pontoon floating breakwater and a double pontoon floating breakwater.Numerical simulations are performed using theδ-SPH model and experimental tests are conducted to validate the numerical model.The numerical results of both the free surface elevations and motions of the floating breakwater are in good agreement with the experimental results.Numerical results show that when the pontoon drafts are larger,the double pontoon floating breakwater performs better in wave attenuations compared with the single pontoon floating breakwater,and for all the drafts,the amplitudes of motions including sway,heave and roll of the double pontoon floating breakwater is always smaller.In addition,increasing the spacing between the two pontoons can further reduce the amplitudes of pontoon motions and improve the wave attenuation ability of the double pontoon floating breakwater.

Wave Extraction and Attenuation Performance of A Hybrid System of An Edinburgh Duck WEC and A Floating Breakwater

Installing the Edinburgh Duck Wave Energy Converter(ED WEC)on a floating breakwater provides a potential solution to reduce costs and improve the reliability of the ED WEC.To investigate the interactions between the ED WEC and the breakwater,a two-dimensional numerical model of a hybrid WEC-breakwater system is established based on Star-CCM+Computational Fluid Dynamics(CFD)software.The wave energy extraction performance,wave attenuation performance,and wave forces on the breakwater of the hybrid system are compared with those of the corresponding single device.The effects of the initial attack angle,the distance between the WEC and the breakwater,and the incident wave height on the pitch motion,energy conversion efficiency,transmission coefficient,and wave forces on the breakwater of the hybrid system are analyzed.The results indicate that combing the ED WEC with a breakwater can improve the energy extraction performance of the ED WEC and reduce the wave forces on the breakwater in shorter-period waves.The conversion efficiency of the hybrid system with the initial attack angle of 42°is the largest in shorter-period waves,but is reduced with the increase of initial attack angle in longer-period waves.The wave attenuation performance of the hybrid system is determined by the draft of the breakwater.The distance between the WEC and the breakwater has little effect on the hybrid system.Wave energy extraction of the ED WEC of the hybrid system decreases significantly with the increase of the incident wave height.

Hydrodynamic Performance of A Dual-Floater Integrated System Com-bining Hybrid WECs and Floating Breakwaters

The high investment and low return of wave energy converters(WECs)seriously hamper their large-scale commercial application.The integration of WECs and floating breakwaters is conducive to enhance the competitiveness of wave energy conversion.The objective of this paper is to investigate the hydrodynamic performance of a WEC-breakwater integrated system combining an upstream oscillating water column(OWC)and a downstream oscillating buoy(OB)via numerical simulations and physical experiments.A nonlinear numerical wave flume using Star-CCM+software is employed to obtain calculated results,where a tiny transverse gap is set between the flume wall and the block surface to simulate a similar two-dimensional(2D)model.The corresponding physical experiments are also carried out in a practical wave flume to verified the numerical results.The comparison of the isolated and hybrid system shows that the hybrid design leads to the decreased conversion efficiency of each WEC,but improves the transmission performance of the hybrid system.The wave resonance between two devices causes the abrupt reduction of OWC efficiency and a positive correlation exists with the OB efficiency.The total efficiency of the hybrid system is raised by an optimal opening ratio,a shallow OWC draft and a short spacing distance.Except for the OWC draft,other design parameters have weak effect on the wave attenuation of the hybrid system.This paper can help understand hydrodynamics of the hybrid WECs integrated with breakwaters and improve their performances.

Vertical membrane floating breakwater

The basic purpose of any breakwater is to protect a harbor, moored vessels or an offshore structure from excessive incident wave attack. Breakwater can be classified as either fixed structures or floating ones. The vertical membrane floating breakwater which will be introduced in this paper belongs to the latter.

Experimental Study on Wave Attenuation Performance of A New Type of Floating Breakwater with Twin Pontoons and Multi Porous Vertical Plates

A floating breakwater(FB)has extensive potential applications in the fields of coastal,offshore,and ocean engineering owing to its advantages such as eco-friendliness,low cost,easy and rapid construction,and quick dismantling and reinstallation.An FB composed of twin pontoons and multi-porous vertical plates is proposed to improve the wave attenuation performance.The wave attenuation performance is investigated for different FB structures and vertical plate types under different incident wave heights and periods using 2D wave physical model tests in a wave flume.The results demonstrate that the proposed FB has a better performance than that of the conventional single pontoon-type FB.It reduces the wave transmission due to its enhanced wave reflection and energy loss.The wave transmission coefficient of the proposed FB decreases with an increase in the number of layers and relative draft depth of the vertical plates.However,a further decrease in the wave transmission coefficient is not observed when the number of porous vertical plates is increased from 4 to 5 layers.An equation has been derived to predict the wave transmission of the proposed FB based on the experimental results.

一种浮式梳式防波堤的消浪性能试验研究

针对一种新型的浮式梳式防波堤的消浪性能进行模型试验研究,试验模型采用固定结构形式,分析相对宽度、相对波高、水流速度和不规则波等因素对透射系数、反射系数和耗散系数的影响。研究结果表明:浮式梳式防波堤的消浪性能较为稳定,在波长较大的情况下,该型防波堤的消浪性能优于相同尺寸的方箱式防波堤;当相对宽度为0.20~0.27时,透射系数能达到最小值;在波与流共同作用下,同向水流会削弱波浪的消浪性能;在相同波浪参数下,不规则波的透射系数要略高于规则波的透射系数。