ABSTRACT
Flow around the vertical plate numerically investigated the effect of wave steepness on drag force under two different geometrical configurations in the intermediate water depth. A numerical wave tank model has been developed based on CFD code ANSYS FLUENT software to achieve this target. The nonlinear water wave propagation in a wave tank is modeled using the volume of fluid (VOF) method. The Finite Volume Method (FVM) is used to solve Navier–Stokes equations. The inflow velocity method is used to produce the desired waves at the inlet, and numerical damping is used to reduce the wave reflection at the end of the wave tank. The test has been conducted in two different cases (Type 1 and Type 2). The effect of wave steepness on the drag force around the two different plate types is analyzed. Velocity vector and surface profile are also analyzed in the velocity field. It is reported that the drag force for Type 1 is more compared to Type 2. This work has a direct implementation in wave energy converter (WEC) to extract renewable wave energy from the ocean.
