Experimental Study of energy dissipation effects of oscillating water column structures

Abstract

Ocean waves are considered an important and representative source of renewable energy, and the development of marine energy resources is considered an important task for marine states. Oscillating water column (OWC) technology is considered one of the most effective and low-cost methods for the development of hundreds of wave-generating devices, and experts have attempted to increase or improve the power generation efficiency of an OWC. However, even if the OWC system does not perform any power generation operation, the OWC itself is also a wave-absorbing structure. Therefore, just looking at the water surface fluctuation in the air chamber or the simulation and evaluation of the output airflow, whether there will be a wrong assessment result for the OWC power generation benefit of a specific design type. As a result, because a large part of the wave energy may be blocked by the acting OWC structure, or the energy is dissipated during the interaction of the waves in the air chamber, which affects the actual power generation benefit evaluation, therefore, the better the wave elimination structure design is, should be a relatively poor design of the OWC generator chamber. In this study, a series of experiments were carried out with both the regular and irregular wave conditions to study the effects of energy dissipation caused by an oscillating water column structure under varied barrier and orifice design. The experimental results showed that, Proper configuration can reduce the loss of wave energy by the OWC structure itself, provide better wave environment and conditions in addition to the power generation benefits of mechanical equipment, and even improve the wave resonance inside the gas tank to increase the potential energy of waves.