Date of Award
2022
Document Type
Open Access Master's Thesis
Degree Name
Master of Science in Mechanical Engineering (MS)
Administrative Home Department
Department of Mechanical Engineering-Engineering Mechanics
Advisor 1
Gordon Parker
Committee Member 1
Wayne Weaver
Committee Member 2
Guy Meadows
Abstract
The marine renewable energy community is interested in maximizing the power generated by nonlinear wave energy converters. Optimal control methods provide a tool to achieve this aim and can also help to inform the buoy design. An energy-optimal control law for a class of non-linear buoy models is derived and is shown to be singular. The solution approach is illustrated using an hourglass-shaped buoy having a cubic, hydrostatic nonlinearity. The optimal control law is only valid on singular arcs, and a method to search for these arcs is presented. Two singular arcs are found for the hourglass buoy model and analyzed. Neither is likely optimal thus, finding the energy-optimal singular arc is left for future work.
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.
Recommended Citation
Nelson, Kevin, "Optimal Control of Nonlinear Wave Energy Converters In Heave for Maximum Power Extraction", Open Access Master's Thesis, Michigan Technological University, 2022.