Performance of oscillating water column wave energy converters integrated in breakwaters

Abstract

Two-dimensional CFD simulations are used to study the response of Oscillating Water Columns (OWC) integrated in breakwaters for different bottom configurations of the OWC chamber. The integration of the OWC in breakwater reduces the costs of investments and generates more energy by using multiple chambers all along the breakwater length in the predominant wave direction. The work is performed to analyse the influence of bottom sloping configurations of OWC on the chamber pressure, free surface motion, free surface velocity and power output of integrated OWC in breakwaters. The optimum wave energy captured and the performance of the OWC device in breakwater is analysed for two different wavelengths in the case of zero damping. The numerical results are computed for the output power for different bottom sloping configurations at resonant condition of the device. © 2016 Taylor & Francis Group, London.