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Title: A systems engineering vision for floating offshore wind cost optimization

Abstract

The U.S. offshore wind resource potential is immense, and often in close proximity to densely-populated coastal load centers. In many U.S. coastal areas, water depths favor the deployment of floating over fixed-bottom offshore wind technology. Floating offshore wind plants have the potential to be cost-competitive with fixed-bottom installations, but because the technology has not yet been deployed at commercial scale, it is not clear when and with what configurations this potential cost parity can be achieved. This article first reviews the state of floating offshore wind technology and deployments to identify key gaps that must be addressed to bring down the overall cost of energy produced. The article then puts forth a long-term vision for a research program and design methodology that may be able to push floating wind plants toward a lower levelized cost of energy than fixed-bottom offshore wind. The method involves a fully integrated systems-engineering and techno-economic design approach to capture the complex interactions between the physics, manufacturing, installation, and operation of floating wind turbines to achieve transformational cost reductions. The approach also envisions multifidelity and uncertainty management strategies to examine the most robust and viable concepts in the design trade-space. To better focus the computational resources,more » engineering lessons learned from existing offshore wind systems and concept studies are used to develop a set of criteria that can be applied to prefilter candidate technology building blocks that have the greatest cost reduction potential.« less

Authors:
ORCiD logo [1]; ORCiD logo [1];  [1]
  1. National Renewable Energy Lab. (NREL), Golden, CO (United States)
Publication Date:
Research Org.:
National Renewable Energy Lab. (NREL), Golden, CO (United States)
Sponsoring Org.:
USDOE Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy (EERE), Renewable Power Office. Wind Energy Technologies Office
OSTI Identifier:
1659806
Alternate Identifier(s):
OSTI ID: 1780218
Report Number(s):
NREL/JA-5000-72594
Journal ID: ISSN 1755-0084; MainId:6020;UUID:1d9b4096-45cd-e811-9c19-ac162d87dfe5;MainAdminID:13397
Grant/Contract Number:  
AC36-08GO28308
Resource Type:
Accepted Manuscript
Journal Name:
Renewable Energy Focus
Additional Journal Information:
Journal Volume: 34; Journal ID: ISSN 1755-0084
Publisher:
Elsevier
Country of Publication:
United States
Language:
English
Subject:
17 WIND ENERGY; floating offshore wind turbine; multidisciplinary optimization (MDO); offshore wind; systems engineering; wind cost

Citation Formats

Barter, Garrett E., Robertson, Amy, and Musial, Walter. A systems engineering vision for floating offshore wind cost optimization. United States: N. p., 2020. Web. doi:10.1016/j.ref.2020.03.002.
Barter, Garrett E., Robertson, Amy, & Musial, Walter. A systems engineering vision for floating offshore wind cost optimization. United States. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ref.2020.03.002
Barter, Garrett E., Robertson, Amy, and Musial, Walter. Sat . "A systems engineering vision for floating offshore wind cost optimization". United States. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ref.2020.03.002. https://www.osti.gov/servlets/purl/1659806.
@article{osti_1659806,
title = {A systems engineering vision for floating offshore wind cost optimization},
author = {Barter, Garrett E. and Robertson, Amy and Musial, Walter},
abstractNote = {The U.S. offshore wind resource potential is immense, and often in close proximity to densely-populated coastal load centers. In many U.S. coastal areas, water depths favor the deployment of floating over fixed-bottom offshore wind technology. Floating offshore wind plants have the potential to be cost-competitive with fixed-bottom installations, but because the technology has not yet been deployed at commercial scale, it is not clear when and with what configurations this potential cost parity can be achieved. This article first reviews the state of floating offshore wind technology and deployments to identify key gaps that must be addressed to bring down the overall cost of energy produced. The article then puts forth a long-term vision for a research program and design methodology that may be able to push floating wind plants toward a lower levelized cost of energy than fixed-bottom offshore wind. The method involves a fully integrated systems-engineering and techno-economic design approach to capture the complex interactions between the physics, manufacturing, installation, and operation of floating wind turbines to achieve transformational cost reductions. The approach also envisions multifidelity and uncertainty management strategies to examine the most robust and viable concepts in the design trade-space. To better focus the computational resources, engineering lessons learned from existing offshore wind systems and concept studies are used to develop a set of criteria that can be applied to prefilter candidate technology building blocks that have the greatest cost reduction potential.},
doi = {10.1016/j.ref.2020.03.002},
journal = {Renewable Energy Focus},
number = ,
volume = 34,
place = {United States},
year = {Sat Jun 13 00:00:00 EDT 2020},
month = {Sat Jun 13 00:00:00 EDT 2020}
}