Open-sea 1:30 scale tests on a spar-type offshore wind turbine in parked conditions: Progress and future work

This paper presents the preliminary results of an open-sea experiment on a 1:30 model of a spar floating support structure for offshore wind turbines, in parked conditions. The experiment has been carried out at the Natural Ocean Engineering Laboratory (NOEL) of Reggio Calabria (Italy), thanks to the suitable local wave conditions, and has the double aim of better investigating the dynamic behaviour of such structure but also to check the potential of low-cost, intermediate-scale open-sea analysis of offshore structures. Through free decay tests and RAOs estimation (six DOF) the system identification has been performed, which has been compared against a set of numerical simulations in ANSYS AQWA. The results obtained in roll are here presented, focusing on the criticalities as well as the advantages of intermediate-scale field testing.