“Floating solar can expand renewable energy capacity without occupying land,” said the study’s corresponding author Luofeng Huang. “Moving it from sheltered lakes and reservoirs to the sea, however, exposes interconnected platforms to waves that can amplify movement and strain the cables holding them together and in place.”
The team of researchers at Cranfield University in the UK and Inha University in South Korea compared three layouts, each containing nine connected floats in a three-by-three grid: all barges, all catamarans, and a front row of barges followed by two rows of catamarans.
“We used detailed computer simulations to track vertical movement, tilting and mooring forces under regular, repeating waves of different lengths,” shared Huang. “The numerical framework had previously been checked against wave-tank experiments on individual floats.”
In shorter waves, the broad, continuous bottoms of barge floats blocked and dissipated wave energy, sheltering the rows behind them.
“Catamaran floats allowed more water through the gap between their hulls, producing more similar movements across the array but less protection downstream,” explained first author Binjian Ou. “In longer waves, catamaran arrays showed peak mooring loads lower than barge arrays.”
Notably, the mixed layout was intended to combine the barges’ shielding with the catamarans’ motion stability. Its limited gains suggest that simply combining two useful designs does not guarantee that their movements and wakes will work well together.
“The best float design depends on the waves at the site,” said Ou. “We need to consider how the whole array moves and shares loads, rather than choosing each float in isolation.”
The findings could guide float selection, array layout, and anchoring design. “The results apply to the tested small arrays and regular waves; future work should examine larger arrays, irregular seas and long-term fatigue, while jointly optimizing float shapes, spacing, connections and moorings,” Ou added.
