Aerodynamic performance of an offshore wind turbine with combined blowing and suction flow control under inflow from air–sea coupled simulations

Offshore wind turbines operating under sheared-inflow conditions of the marine atmospheric boundary layer often experience increased fluctuations in aerodynamic thrust. This study investigates the aerodynamic efficiency of a dual-suction flow jet (D-SFJ) flow control under marine wind conditions. The device comprises two suction slots on the suction side and two injection slots near the trailing edge on the pressure side, and is implemented on the IEA 15 MW reference turbine. Based on the Coupled Ocean Atmosphere Wave Sediment Transport (COAWST) model, the spatial-temporal evolution of wind-wave-current is accurately simulated. Subsequently, leveraging the numerical sheared-inflow profile derived from mesoscale models, a series of three-dimensional unsteady microscale simulations is conducted to analyze the aerodynamic forces of a wind turbine under both constant and time-varying jet scenarios. The findings confirm that the COAWST model has superior capability in predicting the ocean wind speed by considering air-sea interaction, with a Pearson's correlation coefficient of 0.85 at 198 m. For the D-SFJ control device with varying jet strength, the thrust fluctuation, the thrust fluctuation relative to that of the wind turbine without D-SFJ control is reduced, and the net aerodynamic power can be raised by 2.53 %.