Journal of Applied Mechanical Engineering

Numerical and experimental assessment of an inverted cup float used for wave energy conversion

International Conference and Exhibition on Mechanical & Aerospace Engineering

September 30-October 02, 2013 Hilton San Antonio Airport, TX, USA

A. Ramadan

Posters: J Appl Mech Eng

Abstract:

World energy demand is increasing at an alarming rate and producing electricity from alternative or renewable energy sources is becoming necessary. There are many technologies to extract electric energy from sea waves such as: the oscillating water column, the point absorber, the over topping system and the bottom hinged system. Many researchers focused on modeling the floating point absorber, which is thought to be the most cost effective technology to extract energy from sea waves. This work is focusing on a new design of float and the analytical analysis of its performance. This float consists of two parts; a hollow cylinder and an inverted cup fixed to its bottom. The float is initially submerged in water with sufficient submergence float. As water rises up due to the wave action the float will follow the water motion which reduces slamming of the float. When the water level drops the water enclosed in the inverted cup will experience negative pressure which will help the float down to follow the water wave motion without slamming. In this work, an analytical model was used MATLAB software to simulate the system of energy conversion. Moreover, a comparison for this model of the simulation results with experimental data validates the model.

Biography :

A. Ramadan has completed his master the age of 30 years from Ain Shams University Faculty of Engineering and Ph.D. studies from Helwan University Faculty of Engineering-El Mattaria. He is assistant lecturer in the Basic Science department, College of Engineering and Technology, Arab Academy for Science and Technology and Maritime Transport (AAST) Cairo. He has published 4 papers in international conferences and journal.