An approach to assess the potential of wave energy resources based on directional energy flux

Abstract

Estimating the total available wave energy surrounding islands holds significant importance in accessing the hosting capacity of wave energy. This study proposes a novel method for estimating the total available wave energy resources around islands using directional wave energy flux as a key parameter. By introducing the concept of directional across section, this method incorporates the directionality into the total resource calculation. A case study of the northern Zhoushan Archipelago was conducted to demonstrate the practical application of this method. The wave conditions were computed using the SWAN wave model for a 10-year period and validated against 7 months of buoy observations near Shengshan island. Basic wave energy resource characteristics were analyzed and the spatiotemporal features were analyzed using various indices. Subsequently, the proposed method was applied to calculated the total available wave energy around islands at various extend distances from the coastline. The wave energy potential of the islands in the study area stands at 349 MW, 302 MW, 318 MW, and 387 MW respectively, at extend distances of 5 km, 7.5 km, 10 km, and 12.5 km from the shoreline. These values represent approximately 25.1%–42.2% of the total energy obtained using existing methods.