Study on the Influence of Different Shared Mooring Configurations on the Performance of Wave Energy Converter Arrays

To investigate the effects of different shared-mooring configurations on the performance of wave-energy converter arrays under experimental and real-sea conditions, five array layouts comprising four- or twelve-point-absorber wave-energy converters were established. Combined frequency-domain and time-domain numerical analyses were conducted using Ansys Aqwa and OrcaFlex to compare the performance of independently moored arrays and arrays with different shared-mooring configurations under various sea states. The results show that, compared with independently moored arrays and arrays using shared lines only, arrays employing shared anchors exhibit superior overall performance. Moreover, among the arrays using shared mooring alone, the four-device array demonstrates more stable performance than the twelve-device array. These findings provide a basis for the large-scale deployment and commercial application of wave-energy converters.