Location: Penryn Campus, University of Exeter, Penryn, Cornwall TR13 10FE
Primary Supervisor:Â Â Â Prof. Lars Johanning
Secondary supervisor: Â David Parish, University of Exeter
Funding: Â 3.5-year studentship: Tuition fees (UK/EU) and an annual stipend equivalent to current Research Council rates
This PhD will be part of a larger EU-H2020 project, led by the Spanish organisation Tecnalia, entitled ‘OPERA – Open Sea Operating Experience to Reduce Wave Energy Cost’. The primary objective of OPERA is to gather open-sea operating experience to reduce the cost of wave energy. This will be achieved by fully exploiting the opportunity presented by the nationally funded open-sea testing of a floating Oscillating Water Column Wave Energy Converter at BIMEP (Spain) in order to improve survivability and reliability, reduce technological and business risk, and validate promising cost-reducing technologies. The PhD studentship will contribute to WP 2 ‘mooring loads assessment and reduction, shared mooring validation’. A key feature of the project will be collaboration with team members and project partners working on the engineering challenge to inform the design requirements of the hollow braided tether within mooring configuration, developing the numerical model and support the generation of field data for validation purpose. This PhD will specifically support the aim through the development of a numerical model to provide a detailed mechanical characterisation of the tether, supported by bench testing and an in situ measurement campaign. The student will work with both engineering colleagues, using output from the models to inform the design of anchoring systems able to withstand the most extreme conditions that might occur at the site and to understand the wider impacts on the environment and develop appropriate mitigation strategies.
Contact for Informal enquiries: Prof Lars Johanning (tel: 01326 253730)
Application criteria
The suitable PhD candidate will have a strong background in engineering combined with software development. As a consequence a strong mechanical understanding is required to translate these into a numerical model that properly represents the structural behaviour. The candidate will have a strong background in engineering, physics or mathematics and IT. Previous experience of numerical modelling, Matlab programming and working with simulation models such Orcaflex are highly desirable, and experience with filed demonstration would be beneficial.
Postgraduate Research Office:Â emps-pgr-ad@exeter.ac.uk
The closing date for applications is midnight on 3rd January 2016
PhD Studentship in Renewable Energy: Development of a numerical design algorithm for a… https://t.co/WvAZ6s6gs0