Numerical Prediction of Ship-Ice Interaction: A Project Presentation

Abstract

It is inevitable that commercial shipping and oil and gas resource exploitation activities in the Arctic will increase due to decreasing sea ice extent caused by global climate changes. Significantly more demanding and at the same time less well known environmental conditions create a need for reliable methods to assess icebreaking performance guaranteeing safe performance of the ships operating in this area subjected to various ice conditions. The classic approach of assessing ice-going performance, which combines class rules, experience and model tests, may not be applicable for the Arctic region in full. Furthermore, ship yards experience difficulties due to decreasing time frames and financial restrictions. Therefore this paper seeks to introduce a new development for a realistic and validated direct simulation approach for prediction of the hull load and icebreaking resistance that covers all aspects of the industrial design process and allows a more comprehensive analysis. The breaking model will provide a variable breaking pattern and is able to mimic the influence of the vessel speed and the environment on the ice loading and the predicted breaking length. In order to predict the extreme representative conditions to be simulated, a reverse extreme load prediction methodology is incorporated. An efficient, time dependent dynamic coupling between broken ice fragments, ice features, the 3D flow field and the ship’s hull provides resistance values for performance calculations. The computational model will be validated against full-scale data and class rules using deterministic and probabilistic measures. This simulation approach is developed within international research collaboration between Pella Sietas, Rolls Royce Marine, TUHH and NTNU. An overview of the project together with the current status of the ongoing work including first results is presented.

On Characteristics of Ice Ridges and Icebergs for Design of Ship Hulls in Polar Regions Based on Environmental Design Contours

“…This model has later been extended to comprise six degrees-of-freedom (6DOF) by Tan et al [28]. Other studies are, e.g., those based on the finite element method (FEM), the graphics processing unit (GPU) computation basis [2,29], and the cohesive element method (CEM) [30]. In order to study the interaction between ice rubble and ships, numerical methods such as the DEM [31,32] and the FEM [33] have been applied.…”

“…The recent decades have seen an increasing interest and resulting demand for development of Arctic ships and offshore structures. These are used for exploration and extraction of natural resources, and for navigation throughout the Arctic and Antarctic corridors [1,2]. A number of different ice features will generally be of concern in these areas, such as ice ridges and icebergs.…”

Environmental contours based on inverse SORM

“…In recent years, increased plans and activities for maritime transport and for exploiting natural resources, such as oil and gas, minerals, in Arctic regions promoted the requirement of ice-capable vessels and offshore structures [34]. For ships and offshore structures in sea ice fields, a number of different ice types, such as level ice, broken ice, ice ridges (see Fig.…”

“…From the abovementioned measured data obtained by in situ experiments and the probabilistic models given by Eqs. (34) and (35) between these environmental variables can be approximated by the Nataf distribution model, and then, the environmental contours can also be obtained by the Nataf transformation [16].…”

“…This work has been carried out within the MARTEC research project PRICE (Prediction of ice-shipinteraction for icebreaking vessels) [34].…”