Robust optimization for wave energy applications

Producing energy from waves is considered a promising opportunity for the ecological transition. A feature of wave energy converters is their relatively small possibility of scaling up with respect to other sources such as wind. For this reason, reaching economic viability requires building large arrays of devices. The aim of this talk is to present robust optimization strategies for the control design of wave energy converters arrays. The goal is to limit unfavourable hydrodynamic interactions between devices and thus maximize the power output. The obtained results are robust with respect to the direction of incident waves. Robustness is achieved by using stochastic optimization methods: a comparison between stochastic approximation and sample average approximation is presented.

This is joint work with G. Ciaramella, E. Miglio and T. Vanzan.

Contatti: edie.miglio@polimi.it e gabriele.ciaramella@polimi.it