Background
Seventy per cent of the earth's surface is covered by oceans, which have a vital function for life on earth.
The oceans contribute to food and energy as well as mineral
resources, and provide means for transport. Moreover hydrocarbons are
produced from sub-sea reservoirs. Norway's location, natural resources
and topography make these issues particularly important for the
nation. This is reflected in the Norwegian industrial clusters within
the marine sector.
The fundamental research in the Centre of Excellence (CoE) will contribute to the innovation of ships transport and other services, as well as ocean structures relevant for the offshore petroleum industry, aquacultural production and harvesting of natural bio-resources and production of renewable energy from waves, tide, wind and temperature differences. A particular issue is associated with the current trend towards large-scale structures, e.g. fish-farms, floating bridges, airports, long-span pipelines on uneven seabed, deep-water risers and mooring systems.
Within a year 2020 perspective, research will be directed towards ships and ocean structures that are unique in relation to present-day structures due to their higher speed, larger size (and hence increased flexibility), new designs or the introduction of novel automatic control systems (fluid, air, foils, thrusters etc.). New types of more demanding marine operations in deep-water will emerge. The improved insight will create opportunities for innovative design and operational procedures as well as improved safety.
The Centre will contribute generic knowledge that can serve as a basis for the future development of marine technologies, and for other industries engaged in similar activities. This includes mehodology that facilitates transparent, explicit safety requirements, design by "direct analyses" based on "first principles" of hydrodynamic loads and their structural effects and strength. Structural safety under extreme and cyclic (fatigue) loading, implemented in risk-based rules and regulations, is an area that requires particular attention. This applies to novel concepts such as high speed vessels, offshore oil and gas installations and large-scale fish-farms. The effects of human factors and automatic control on the system reliability and operational performance have to be addressed. Preventing accidents from escalating is also an issue of considerable importance.
Moreover, the Centre will deal with advanced marine operations in deep water, such as laying pipelines or cables, for installing sub-sea equipment as well as inspection, maintenance and repair/replacements of underwater facilities, using all-year service vessels or platforms. The combination of deep-water, harsh wave conditions and ocean currents makes design and operation of riser and mooring systems particularly challenging. The benefit of automatic control of motions and other responses will be explored.
Materializing the vision of a ten-fold increase in the production of marine bio-resources requires the development of existing modes of operation and new concepts for sea-farming and harvesting. Large, mobile facilities consisting of large volume buoyancy tanks and slender members with nets to provide the containment, which can be elevated and positioned by mooring and thrusters, for operation in open sea are envisaged.
To understand the behaviour of ships and ocean structures and their operation in the marine environment, the interaction between water and structures, i.e. the hydroelastic behaviour, is of particular importance. The stochastic nature of waves needs to be addressed in order to find the structural response they induce and to provide a rational basis for decisions related to design and operations planning for ships and ocean structures. Automatic control is crucial for meeting the future requirements for high performance and for satisfying the need to operate under demanding environmental conditions. This requires a tight integration between hydrodynamics and structural dynamics. Moreover, this is important in connection to the consideration of safety at sea and environmental protection, which are high priority areas. In addition, the challenges relating to design and the understanding of the behaviour of ships and ocean structures are also increasingly becoming a requirement for proper planning and execution of marine operations. They include loading operations at sea between floating production (oil/gas, fish) and transport facilities or between supply vessel and floating facility (e.g. tanker and naval vessel), installation/ intervention in the ocean space, possibly involving multiple bodies.