A Dynamic Parametric Wind Farm Model for Simulating Time-varying Wind Conditions and Floating Platform Motion

Abstract: This paper introduces a dynamic parametric wind farm model that is capable of simulating floating wind turbine platform motion coupled with wake transport under time-varying wind conditions. The simulator is named FOWFSim-Dyn as it is a dynamic extension of the previously developed steady-state Floating Offshore Wind Farm Simulator (FOWFSim). One-dimensional momentum conservation is used to model dynamic propagation of wake centerline locations and average velocities, while momentum recovery is approximated with the assumption of a constant temporal wake expansion rate. Platform dynamics are captured by treating a floating offshore wind farm as a distribution of particles that are subject to aerodynamic, hydrodynamic, and mooring line forces. The finite difference method is used to discretize the momentum conservation equations to yield a nonlinear state-space model. Simulated data are validated against steady-state experimental wind tunnel results obtained from the literature. Predictions of wake centerlines differed from experimental results by at most 8.19% of the rotor diameter. Simulated wake velocity profiles in the far-wake region differed from experimental measurements by less than 3.87% of the free stream wind speed. FOWFSim-Dyn thus possesses a satisfactory level of fidelity for engineering applications. Finally, dynamic simulations are conducted to ensure that time-varying predictions match physical expectations and intuition.