Heading Control of a Turret Moored Offshore Structure Using Re-solved Motion and Acceleration Control

Abstract

This paper addresses the heading control of an offshore floating storage and regasification unit (FSRU) using a resolved motion and acceleration control (RMAC) algorithm. A turret moored vessel tends to have the slewing motion. This slewing motion may cause a considerable decrease in working time in loading and unloading opera-tion because the sloshing in the LNG containment tank might happen and/or the collision between FSRU and LNGC may take place. In order to deal with the downtime problem due to this slewing motion, a heading control system for the turret moored FSRU is developed, and a series of model tests with azimuth thrusters on the FSRU is conducted. A Kalman filter is applied to estimate the low-frequency motion of the vessel. The RMAC algorithm is employed as a primary heading control method and modified I-controller is introduced to reduce the steady-state errors of the heading of the FSRU.