A study of internal wave influence on OTEC systems

Ocean Thermal Energy Conversion (OTEC) systems utilize the temperature difference between the surface water and deep ocean water to generate electrical energy. In addition to ocean surface waves, wind and current, in certain locations like the Andaman Sea, Sulu Sea and the South China Sea the presence of strong internal waves may become a concern in floating OTEC system design. The current paper focuses on studying the dependence of the CWP hydrodynamic drag on relative velocity of the flow around the pipe, the effect of drag amplification due to vortex induced vibrations and the influence of internal waves on the floating semi and the cold water pipe integrated OTEC system. Two CWP sizes are modeled; the 4m diameter pipe represents a small scale prototype and the 10m diameter pipe represents a full commercial size CWP. are considered in the study.