Numerical Study of Air Chamber for Oscillating Water Column Wave Energy Convertor

Abstract

Oscillating Water Column (OWC) wave energy converting system is one of the most widely used facilities all over the world. The air chamber is utilized to convert the wave energy into the pneumatic energy. The numerical wave tank based on the two-phase VOF model is established in the present study to investigate the operating performance of OWC air chamber. The RANS equations, standard k-epsilon turbulence model and dynamic mesh technology are employed in the numerical model. The effects of incident wave conditions and shape parameters on the wave energy converting efficiency are studied and the capability of the present numerical wave tank on the corresponding engineering application is validated.