IFREMER – Wave and Current Flume Tank
TA82 – UCC-IFREMER-WaCuTa
Location
150 Quai Gambetta
62200 Boulogne sur Mer, France
Description
Description of the infrastructure:
The Wave and Current flume tank is operated by the Marine Hydrodynamic Laboratory at IFREMER, to test renewable energy systems in controllable marine environment where in-situ characteristics can be reproduced in term of velocity profile (vertical repartitions, orientation, temporal evolution), turbulence characteristics (intensity level, vortex structures) and combined wave and current solicitation. With a 8m2 rectangular testing section, an 8-paddle segmented wavemaker and a twin-propellers current generators (250kW each) and a volume of over 700 thousand liters of water, WaCuTa possesses unique capabilities for scaled testing and the recreation of complex flows that cannot be found in any other facility around the world.
The tank is 18m long, 4m wide and 2m deep with a flow velocity up to 2m/s. The vertical velocity profile can be adjusted by means of specific grids/honeycomb assemblies and the orientation regulated by the use of a dynamic rotating instrumented platform. The bottom floor is instrumented and lift-able to the surface in order to facilitate and optimise the model installation and adjustment during tests.
The flow turbulence characteristics can also be adjusted by means of specific grids/honeycomb assemblies. Turbulence induced by bathymetry variations can be simulated with turbulence intensity levels between 1.5 and 20% and vortex structures up to 1m in diameter.
The wave maker can produce regular or irregular waves (with or against the current) with a period range between 0.5 and 2s and a maximum crest to trough wave height of 30cm. The wave can be combined with specific turbulence characteristics and flow velocity repartitions.
A six-motions generator system can also be used to reproduce dynamics of a floating platform in the presence of waves and also the inflow orientation variations that can be encountered during tide cycles.
Services offered by the infrastructure:
The WaCuTa team offers the complete service for hydrodynamic force and moment measurements on fixed and moving devices, behaviour and performances characterisation in a range of wave and current conditions, non-intrusive velocity measurement and time-resolved flow analysis, data acquisition and analysis through dedicated software.
Specific developments carried out under PhD work, internal, National and European research projects increased the WaCuTa team's scientific knowledge of the wave/current/bathymetry/structure interactions and thus its ability to meet the needs of the researchers and innovators, devoted to finding new solutions to accelerate the green transition.
Testing Capabilities
The WaCuTa capabilities and materials have been developed tacking into account the industrial feedback and needs for the development of horizontal and vertical tidal turbine converters as well as flapping, venturi and undulating systems. More than 35 kind of technologies have been tested in WaCuTa over the last decade, demonstrating the widespread interest from European users to conduct research at the Ifremer Wave and Current flume Tank. Thus, the WaCuTa team's scientific knowledge of the wave/current/bathymetry/structure interactions is unique and worldwide recognised worldwide.
Technical Equipment
The Boulogne-sur-Mer flume tank is equipped with whole and performance measurement facilities specific to hydrodynamics. In particular it provides measurements of main mechanical stresses on testing devices and allows for the study and visualisation of the water flow and the dynamical behaviour of the models :
- 2D PIV and 3C LDV systems for non-intrusive velocity measurement
- 3 and 6 components load-cells
- 3D air and submarine motion tracking system
A full instrumented (torque, thrust, rotational speed, angular position, blade loads) horizontal axis turbine model can be made available for the needs of research teams. Test protocols have been developed through projects carried out in recent years (on more than 35 types of technology), in particular thanks to Marinet2 TNA (and Round Robin testing programme) and the Met-Certified project (Interreg 2 Seas).
The WaCuTa team offers a complete technical support for experiments set-up and instrumentation, including an in-house workshop and Computer Aided Design (CAD) capacity. The Ifremer team of experts has a long-standing experience in marine renewable energy model testing and data analysis.
Ifremer also offers support to the Seanoe Sea scientific data publication system and, for young researchers (or non-experts in physical test), and ad-hoc users’ training can be proposed.
Additional information
Technology Readiness Level: 4-6
Special considerations: N/A
Technology clusters: Ocean Energy
Website: https://manchemerdunord.ifremer.fr/en/Marine-technology
Availability: All year
Provision of tools to prepare data sets in a FAIR way: Yes
