Project overview:

Design and Certification of Taut-synthetic Moorings for Floating Wind Turbines

Awardee:

University of Maine

Start Date:

Q1, 2021

Technical Challenge Area:

Floating Structure Engineering

Completion Date:

N/A (Currently Underway)

Synopsis:

UMaine will design, validate through testing, and qualify for use a low-cost taut synthetic rope mooring system for 15MW+ FOWTs for water depths of 45m-80m to alleviate limitations associated with traditional catenary moorings at these depths.

Target Outcomes:

A 15MW FOWT design using a taut synthetic mooring system capable of being deployed at intermediate water depths on the east coast with a targeted LCOE of 7¢/kW-hr.

This newly designed FOWT taut synthetic mooring technology shall seek to advance to TRL 8 through scaled model testing and full-scale rope testing.

Additionally, third party reviews conducted by national labs and offshore classification societies will verify the system's performance and cost effectiveness.