Influence of damping on an oscillating water column wec integrated with a breakwater

Abstract

In the present study, the oscillating water column under consideration is integrated with caisson type breakwater. The air column under pressure due to the damping from the PTO device drives the turbine placed at the orifice of OWC. The relationship between the hydrodynamic efficiency of the OWC and the PTO damping is analyzed which would give more precision about efficient wave energy extraction using an OWC. The PTO damping on the chamber is characterized using a linear pressure drop law with the permeability coefficient derived from Darcy�s equation for flow through porous media. An open Computational Fluid Dynamics tool, REFF3D, is used for the simulations to analyze the reaction of the OWC under different different damping conditions due to the PTO device. Flat bottom and slope bottom configurations are studied and the results are obtained for zero damping, low damping, moderate damping and high damping. The hydrodynamic efficiency for the flat and slope bottom configurations with breakwater are compared to analyze the performance of OWC integrated with breakwater due to the change in the bottom configuration inside the OWC chamber. � 2019 Taylor & Francis Group, London.