A study on wave energy converter arrays using data-driven polynomial chaos expansion

Abstract

Wave energy converter (WEC) arrays should be designed to ensure consistent and optimal power production over long operational periods. This requires an understanding of stochastic wave variability, interactive effects among devices and their mutual dependence. In this work, a computationally efficient surrogate modelling framework was developed using data-driven polynomial chaos expansion (PCE) to analyze the performance of WEC arrays under realistic sea state conditions spanning 30 years. For this purpose, using Latin hypercube sampling scheme on a joint probability distribution derived from the ECHOWAVE hindcast dataset, resulting $10^6$ combinations of significant wave height (Hs), wave period (Tp), and WEC radius (R) for two array configurations—interacting and non-interacting cases were evaluated. The surrogate model was set up to evaluate the performance of WEC arrays by means of global sensitivity analysis using Sobol indices. The results conclude that the interactive effects significantly alter the contribution of design parameters (like geometry and spatial configurations) to power output, emphasizing the inadequacy of single-device analysis for array optimization. The findings highlight the importance of tailored WEC design within arrays and offer a robust approach for long-term performance prediction and optimization of wave energy farms.