Wake momentum recovery of a horizontal axial tidal turbine under turbulence

Tidal turbines deployed at tidal energy sites suffer high-turbulence flows, posing challenges for the estimation of their survivability and energy production. Our work implements an active grid to generate a homogeneous, high-turbulence flow replicating the flow characteristics at those sites in a water tunnel. Important terms in the Reynolds-averaged Navier--Stokes equations are quantified based on the measured wake field data for a comprehensive wake recovery analysis. The results further demonstrate that the tip vortices become extremely unstable under turbulence within one diameter downstream, reshaping the distribution of turbulence kinetic energy production and Reynolds shear stresses.