An improved porous media model for simulating the flow–nets interaction

Abstract

This study presents an improved porous media model for simulating the interaction between the fixed aquaculture nets and flow. The fluid motion is computed based on the Reynolds time-averaged Navier–Stokes equations on the regular Eulerian mesh. The porous media model simulates the nets, where the interface between the complex shapes of the nets and the fluid is determined by the continuous forced immersed boundary (IB) method. The fluid volume fraction is defined and embedded in the porous media coefficients and porosity equations to set the porous media parameters at IB. Several cases validate the model, including the flow interactions with the single net panel, gravity net cage, and offshore aquaculture platform. Meanwhile, the effects of incoming velocity, attack angle, solidity, and the shape of the net on the simulation are investigated. The numerical model can reasonably predict the hydrodynamic of the nets with a relative error of less than 8%. Moreover, the computational efficiency of the hydrodynamic of complex shaped nets is significantly improved, with a maximum of about 11.54 times.