Design of Double-Skinned Composite Tubular Offshore Wind Turbine Tower

Abstract

A double-skinned composite tubular (DSCT) offshore wind power tower was suggested and an automatic section design software was developed. The DSCT offshore wind tower has two types. One has steel tubes and the other has fiber reinforced polymer (FRP) tubes. The developed software adopted the nonlinear material model and the nonlinear column model which was proposed by Han et al. (2010, 2013). If an outer diameter, material properties and requested capacities are given for the DSCT wind power tower, the developed software performs axial force-bending moment interaction analyses for hundreds of sections of the tower and suggests ten optimized section designs. By using the developed software, example design processes were performed for a 5.0MW turbine and a 3.6MW turbine. The steel and FRP were considered as the material of inner and outer tubes. The designed section and analysis results showed that the developed suggested rational and satisfactory section designs. And they showed the possibility which a DSCT tower can be used as a offshore wind power tower.ymer (FRP) tubes. The developed software adopted the nonlinear material model and the nonlinear column model which was proposed by Han et al. (2010, 2013). If an outer diameter, material properties and requested capacities are given for the DSCT wind power tower, the developed software performs axial force-bending moment interaction analyses for hundreds of sections of the tower and suggests ten optimized section designs. By using the developed software, example design processes were performed for a 5.0MW turbine and a 3.6MW turbine. The steel and FRP were considered as the material of inner and outer tubes. The designed section and analysis results showed that the developed suggested rational and satisfactory section designs. And they showed the possibility which a DSCT tower can be used as a offshore wind power tower.