UMaine’s Wind-Wave Generating Lab Will Replicate Realistic, To-Scale Ocean Conditions

What’s it like to weather a perfect storm?

Engineers at the University of Maine Advanced Structures and Composites Center and Maine Maritime Academy (MMA) soon will find out.

They’ll have the capability to create one.

Earlier this summer, UMaine broke ground for an $8 million facility that will house W² — the world’s first wind and wave lab to feature a rotating open-jet wind tunnel above a 100-foot-long by 30-foot-wide by 15-foot-deep wave basin.

Waves and wind can be created from different directions converging at a point and creating a perfect storm. The W² facility is an expansion of the UMaine Composites Center, which will increase in size from 83,000 square feet to 100,000 square feet.

“Our current 83,000-square-foot laboratory is used to design, fabricate and test large structures under simulated static, fatigue, earthquake, wind and vehicular loads, and has been doing so for clients around the world for nearly 18 years,” says Habib Dagher, professor of civil/structural engineering, Bath Iron Works Professor of Structural Engineering and founding director of the UMaine Composites Center.

“With the W² facility, we are adding more capabilities to test advanced structures under combined aero- and hydrodynamics loadings.”

UMaine and its partners — including students, MMA engineer Rich Kimball and industrial colleagues — will be able to assume the role of Mother Nature in the wind-wave generating lab.

A wave maker at one end of the basin will be capable of creating waves of varying frequency and as high as 2 feet. The rotating open-wind jet tunnel will produce wind that howls as fast as 22 mph and that can be manipulated to change direction. Scientists also will be able to move the basin’s concrete floor up and down to model a variety of ocean depths.

Picture scenes from The Perfect Storm and The Truman Show.

But rather than stage movie scenes, W² will allow researchers to physically replicate a myriad of realistic, to-scale ocean conditions — in the Gulf of Maine, Gulf of California, Gulf of Mexico, Canada’s eastern seaboard, the North Sea and the Persian Gulf.

“This is a huge opportunity. It’s a landmark,” says Dagher.

Offshore wind turbines, tidal energy devices, seafaring vessels and oil and gas rigs will be able to be tested under a variety of wind and wave conditions. By directly observing structures’ performances, researchers can expect to improve the structures’ respective designs.

“Wind squall, where winds change direction and intensity rapidly, is an important design condition for many ship-shaped structures producing oil and gas in various parts of the world. We can simulate such an environment in W²,” says Krish Thiagarajan, Correll Presidential Chair in Energy and professor of mechanical engineering at UMaine.

And, a beach at one end of the wave basin will enable coastal engineers to study erosion, seawalls, breakwaters, and the impact of sea-level rise on communities. The facility, says Dagher, could also be geared for aquaculture structures research.

For Dagher, Thiagarajan and fellow engineers in the UMaine Composites Center, including Andrew Goupee and Qinping Zou, W² will be an integral addition to the adjacent University of Maine Offshore Wind Laboratory.

There, UMaine scientists are developing commercial technologies to harness power from deepwater offshore wind. In May 2013, UMaine and its partners launched VolturnUs 1:8, the nation’s first grid-connected offshore wind turbine.

The 65-foot-tall semisubmersible floating turbine has a foundation of hollow concrete tubes, catenary mooring lines and a composite materials tower. During its approximate yearlong mooring off the coast of Castine, it collected valuable data to advance its design and performance. VolturnUS 1:8 is a scale prototype for a 6-megawatt floating wind turbine with blades the length of a Boeing 747’s wingspan.

W², says Dagher, will further enable UMaine scientists to research how offshore wind can be cost-effectively harnessed. Studies indicate offshore wind energy capacity within 50 miles of the United States is four times the nation’s current total generation capacity.

Company leaders from a variety of fields surveyed around the country have expressed interest in advancing their respective technologies at the laboratory, says Dagher.

They’ll have to be patient, though.

UMaine is scheduled for the first project when the world-class physical modeling environment is complete in May 2015 — testing a vertical-axis floating wind turbine.

W² was designed and is being built in conjunction with partners Sandia National Laboratories, National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) and MMA.

Cianbro Corp. is constructing the facility and Tom Perkins of Dirigo Architectural Engineering LLC in Turner is project manager.

The $8 million investment to design, construct and equip the W² facility was secured from outside the university, including successful grant proposals from the National Science Foundation Major Research Instrumentation program and the Department of Commerce Economic Development Administration.

“It was a dream that we have been working hard to design and finance for six years, and now it’s being built; I cannot wait to see industry and students using it,” Dagher says.

Contact: Beth Staples, 207.581.3777