Breaking waves and their applications to the offshore wind sector: Habilitation to drive research (Habilitation à Diriger des Recherches, HDR).

Abstract

This document presents research efforts dedicated to improve the characterizationof breaking waves and of their multiple effects on offshore wind turbines.The manuscript focuses first on the definition of the breaking onset criterionthat is important for the design of offshore wind turbines. It further presentsrecent advances in the parameterization of the wave breaking statistics, neededto identify the design sea states, when slamming loads are considered. This isfollowed by a description of efforts to improve the spectral wave models, used toobtain the wave climatology at offshore wind farms location.Observational works to capture area of wave energy focusing (potentially featuringbreaking waves) are then introduced. The document further presents experimentalefforts to observe interactions between large amplitude breaking wavesand offshore structures.Finally, different perspectives targeting the improvement of the above-citedresearch axes are given, and extension to other applications are discussed. Theseapplications cover the effects of breaking waves on the characterization of the windproperties with spaceborne measurements and ocean-wave-atmosphere couplednumerical models