Date of Award

Fall 2024

Project Type

Thesis

Program or Major

Ocean Engineering

Degree Name

Master of Science

First Advisor

Martin Wosnik

Second Advisor

Thomas Lippmann

Third Advisor

Vincent Neary

Abstract

The University of New Hampshire (UNH) and XFlow Energy jointly designed and built a scale axial-flow turbine (AFT) test bed under the Atlantic Marine Energy Center (AMEC) work scope. The test bed was fabricated to fill an infrastructure gap in tidal energy testing equipment at UNH. The combination of rotor size and achievable towing speeds allowed for testing in a regime where turbine performance became independent of Reynolds number effects, while also maintaining reasonable blockage. As a result, data collected from the test bed can be used to predict the performance of full-scale tidal turbines. Results and uncertainty analysis were rendered for experiments evaluating the performance and blade-loading behavior of a 1 meter diameter MHKF1 rotor in steady, uniform inflow. Performance coefficient results show high power performance over a broad range of tip-speed ratios, which is in agreement with other scale physical and numerical modeling experiments using the same hydrofoils. This baseline characterization has facilitated planning for future experiments using the test bed, with the goal of testing AFT designs and providing data for numerical model validation and verification (V&V) to the nascent marine energy industry.

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