Ørsted and the University of Oxford in the U.K. have signed a five-year research agreement to optimize the design of foundation structures for offshore wind turbines.
Ørsted says continuing to drive down costs is critical for the offshore wind industry. In turn, the company is working with several universities to help improve the design and performance of turbines. A major collaboration on wind turbine design is currently ongoing with Durham University, but this new agreement with the University of Oxford will focus specifically on foundation design.
According to Ørsted, more advanced geotechnical designs for foundations can make a major impact on cost reduction, as the foundations contribute significantly to the overall wind turbine capital costs. The partners have already collaborated on a range of projects for over 10 years, including the recently completed PISA (Pile Soil Analysis) project, leading to significant improvements in the design of offshore wind foundations, says Ørsted.
The research under the new framework agreement will further develop, extend and embed new geotechnical design ideas into well-defined engineering methods for offshore wind power. The focus will be on cyclic loading, which is an important element of safe design, especially for deeper water and larger turbines, says Ørsted.
Byron Byrne, professor of engineering science at the University of Oxford, says, “This exciting new phase of collaboration with Ørsted will put the next generation of offshore wind farms on more secure and cost-effective foundations through robust design methods for cyclic loading. This will be challenging but essential if the cost of offshore wind energy is to be further reduced.”
