Numerical Design and Validation of a Flexible Offshore Photovoltaic Floater

NaturSea-PV, a European Union funded project under the Horizon program, aims to develop a lily-inspired floating photovoltaic design for the Offshore environment. The solar deck spans are supported by a lightweight, flexible eco-UHPC radial–tangential girder system arranged in an umbrella-like configuration. The conceptual and global design has been developed numerically and will serve as a foundation for detailed structural design. The designs are evaluated based on the criteria that there is no wave impact on the solar deck, and that the loads on the beams remain within permissible limits while maintaining economic efficiency. The initial design and optimization are based on hydrodynamic simulations that are performed based on a Morison-type approach. These simulations are carried out in aNySIM, an in-house time domain solver. Different global and local structure variations are investigated. The radial and tangential beams of the Lily concept are modified to orthogonal beams since it is more beneficial for simplicity and cost-efficiency. A local structure design with a wider floater diameter and an addon column of a reduced diameter is selected for the final design, as it is the only feasible option that resulted in a positive airgap without increasing the mass of the floater. Further parametric design is performed for systematic variations in global parameters (side length, amount of rings) and local parameters (floater height and diameter). Based on this design, a model-scale test campaign was performed. These test results have been used to validate the numerical tools by performing model-the-model simulations.