A Study of Multi-Component Oscillating-Foil Hydrokinetic Turbines with a GPU-Accelerated Boundary Element Method

Abstract

A biomimetic semi-activated oscillating-foil device with multiple foils in a parallel configuration is studied for the extraction of marine renewable energy. For the present investigation, an unsteady boundary element method (BEM) is used for the simulation of 3D lifting flows. For this work, the device is assumed to be submerged far from the free surface and the sea bottom. However, the geometry of the body and the initial shape of the wake are general. For the numerical simulations, a high performance in-house GPU-accelerated code (GPU-BEM) is developed. For the calculation of singular integrals, an adaptive algorithm based on the Gauss–Lobatto quadrature is used. Concerning the numerical scheme of GPU-BEM, the convergence of the method was tested, the numerical characteristics were determined and the method was validated. A parametric study of a single-foil device is presented to determine the performance characteristics of such devices. Next, twin-foil devices are investigated in parallel and staggered configurations with a phase difference between the two foils. Finally, the multiple-foil parallel configuration is compared against turbines. After enhancement and further verification, the present method is proposed for the design and control of such biomimetic devices for the extraction of energy from waves and tidal currents nearshore.