IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/rensus/v212y2025ics1364032124009572.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Mooring design for floating wind turbines: A review

Author

Listed:
  • Jiang, Zhiyu

Abstract

Mooring systems are essential for ensuring the safety and station-keeping of floating offshore structures. Despite advances in mooring technologies over the past two decades, several design challenges remain. The design of mooring systems is a multidisciplinary task that requires expertise in marine hydrodynamics, structural mechanics, materials engineering, and mechanical design. This paper reviews state-of-the-art mooring designs for floating wind turbines, addressing key aspects such as floater-mooring interactions, material and component selection, design methods and guidelines, simulation tools, and innovative solutions. This review critically examines existing mooring designs for three types of floating wind turbines from 20 projects, presents eight mooring materials, and compares three design guidelines. Additionally, three innovative mooring solutions are highlighted at the farm level. Finally, six areas for future research are identified. This review aims to contribute to the development of safe, robust, and cost-effective mooring systems for the floating wind industry.

Suggested Citation

  • Jiang, Zhiyu, 2025. "Mooring design for floating wind turbines: A review," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 212(C).
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:rensus:v:212:y:2025:i:c:s1364032124009572
    DOI: 10.1016/j.rser.2024.115231
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1364032124009572
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.rser.2024.115231?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to

    for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Shengjie Rui & Hang Xu & Long Teng & Chen Xi & Xingye Sun & Haojie Zhang & Kanmin Shen, 2023. "A Framework for Mooring and Anchor Design in Sand Considering Seabed Trenches Based on Floater Hydrodynamics," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 15(12), pages 1-17, June.
    2. Liu, Y. & Hajj, M. & Bao, Y., 2022. "Review of robot-based damage assessment for offshore wind turbines," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 158(C).
    3. Jiang, Zhiyu, 2021. "Installation of offshore wind turbines: A technical review," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 139(C).
    4. Rentschler, Manuel U.T. & Adam, Frank & Chainho, Paulo, 2019. "Design optimization of dynamic inter-array cable systems for floating offshore wind turbines," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 111(C), pages 622-635.
    5. Bowen Zhou & Zhibo Zhang & Guangdi Li & Dongsheng Yang & Matilde Santos, 2023. "Review of Key Technologies for Offshore Floating Wind Power Generation," Energies, MDPI, vol. 16(2), pages 1-26, January.
    6. Josh Davidson & John V. Ringwood, 2017. "Mathematical Modelling of Mooring Systems for Wave Energy Converters—A Review," Energies, MDPI, vol. 10(5), pages 1-46, May.
    7. Zhiyu Jiang & Weifei Hu & Wenbin Dong & Zhen Gao & Zhengru Ren, 2017. "Structural Reliability Analysis of Wind Turbines: A Review," Energies, MDPI, vol. 10(12), pages 1-25, December.
    8. Clark, Caitlyn E. & DuPont, Bryony, 2018. "Reliability-based design optimization in offshore renewable energy systems," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 97(C), pages 390-400.
    9. Michael Borg & Morten Walkusch Jensen & Scott Urquhart & Morten Thøtt Andersen & Jonas Bjerg Thomsen & Henrik Stiesdal, 2020. "Technical Definition of the TetraSpar Demonstrator Floating Wind Turbine Foundation," Energies, MDPI, vol. 13(18), pages 1-11, September.
    10. Lozon, Ericka & Hall, Matthew, 2023. "Coupled loads analysis of a novel shared-mooring floating wind farm," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 332(C).
    11. Cheynet, Etienne & Li, Lin & Jiang, Zhiyu, 2024. "Metocean conditions at two Norwegian sites for development of offshore wind farms," Renewable Energy, Elsevier, vol. 224(C).
    12. Watson, Simon & Moro, Alberto & Reis, Vera & Baniotopoulos, Charalampos & Barth, Stephan & Bartoli, Gianni & Bauer, Florian & Boelman, Elisa & Bosse, Dennis & Cherubini, Antonello & Croce, Alessandro , 2019. "Future emerging technologies in the wind power sector: A European perspective," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 113(C), pages 1-1.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Jiang, Zhiyu & Yang, Limin & Gao, Zhen & Moan, Torgeir, 2022. "Integrated dynamic analysis of a spar floating wind turbine with a hydraulic drivetrain," Renewable Energy, Elsevier, vol. 201(P1), pages 608-623.
    2. Ghigo, Alberto & Faraggiana, Emilio & Giorgi, Giuseppe & Mattiazzo, Giuliana & Bracco, Giovanni, 2024. "Floating Vertical Axis Wind Turbines for offshore applications among potentialities and challenges: A review," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 193(C).
    3. Bórawski, Piotr & Bełdycka-Bórawska, Aneta & Jankowski, Krzysztof Jóżef & Dubis, Bogdan & Dunn, James W., 2020. "Development of wind energy market in the European Union," Renewable Energy, Elsevier, vol. 161(C), pages 691-700.
    4. Xu, Sheng & Wang, Shan & Guedes Soares, C., 2019. "Review of mooring design for floating wave energy converters," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 111(C), pages 595-621.
    5. Göteman, Malin & Panteli, Mathaios & Rutgersson, Anna & Hayez, Léa & Virtanen, Mikko J. & Anvari, Mehrnaz & Johansson, Jonas, 2025. "Resilience of offshore renewable energy systems to extreme metocean conditions: A review," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 216(C).
    6. Wan, Ling & Moan, Torgeir & Gao, Zhen & Shi, Wei, 2024. "A review on the technical development of combined wind and wave energy conversion systems," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 294(C).
    7. Ramezani, Mahyar & Choe, Do-Eun & Heydarpour, Khashayar & Koo, Bonjun, 2023. "Uncertainty models for the structural design of floating offshore wind turbines: A review," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 185(C).
    8. Cuesta, Jokin & Leturiondo, Urko & Vidal, Yolanda & Pozo, Francesc, 2025. "A review of prognostics and health management techniques in wind energy," Reliability Engineering and System Safety, Elsevier, vol. 260(C).
    9. Deirdre O’Donnell & Jimmy Murphy & Vikram Pakrashi, 2020. "Damage Monitoring of a Catenary Moored Spar Platform for Renewable Energy Devices," Energies, MDPI, vol. 13(14), pages 1-22, July.
    10. Zeng, Xinmeng & Shao, Yanlin & Feng, Xingya & Xu, Kun & Jin, Ruijia & Li, Huajun, 2024. "Nonlinear hydrodynamics of floating offshore wind turbines: A review," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 191(C).
    11. Bon-Yong Koo & Dae-Yi Jung, 2019. "A Comparative Study on Primary Bearing Rating Life of a 5-MW Two-Blade Wind Turbine System Based on Two Different Control Domains," Energies, MDPI, vol. 12(13), pages 1-16, July.
    12. Giannini, Gianmaria & Rosa-Santos, Paulo & Ramos, Victor & Taveira-Pinto, Francisco, 2022. "Wave energy converters design combining hydrodynamic performance and structural assessment," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 249(C).
    13. Osorio, Julian D. & Panwar, Mayank & Rivera-Alvarez, Alejandro & Chryssostomidis, Chrys & Hovsapian, Rob & Mohanpurkar, Manish & Chanda, Sayonsom & Williams, Herbert, 2020. "Enabling thermal efficiency improvement and waste heat recovery using liquid air harnessed from offshore renewable energy sources," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 275(C).
    14. Ceferino, Luis & Lin, Ning & Xi, Dazhi, 2023. "Bayesian updating of solar panel fragility curves and implications of higher panel strength for solar generation resilience," Reliability Engineering and System Safety, Elsevier, vol. 229(C).
    15. Song, Yupeng & Basu, Biswajit & Zhang, Zili & Sørensen, John Dalsgaard & Li, Jie & Chen, Jianbing, 2021. "Dynamic reliability analysis of a floating offshore wind turbine under wind-wave joint excitations via probability density evolution method," Renewable Energy, Elsevier, vol. 168(C), pages 991-1014.
    16. Wang, Hao & Wang, Tongguang & Ke, Shitang & Hu, Liang & Xie, Jiaojie & Cai, Xin & Cao, Jiufa & Ren, Yuxin, 2023. "Assessing code-based design wind loads for offshore wind turbines in China against typhoons," Renewable Energy, Elsevier, vol. 212(C), pages 669-682.
    17. Han, Dongdong & Wang, Wenhua & Li, Xin & Su, Xiaohui, 2025. "Vibration mitigation of floating offshore wind turbine using tuned liquid column damper under typical limit states," Renewable Energy, Elsevier, vol. 245(C).
    18. Arabgolarcheh, Alireza & Rouhollahi, Amirhossein & Benini, Ernesto, 2023. "Analysis of middle-to-far wake behind floating offshore wind turbines in the presence of multiple platform motions," Renewable Energy, Elsevier, vol. 208(C), pages 546-560.
    19. Hu, Weifei & Fang, Jianhao & Zhang, Yaxuan & Liu, Zhenyu & Verma, Amrit Shankar & Liu, Hongwei & Cong, Feiyun & Tan, Jianrong, 2025. "Digital twin of wind turbine surface damage detection based on deep learning-aided drone inspection," Renewable Energy, Elsevier, vol. 241(C).
    20. Jonas Bjerg Thomsen & Roger Bergua & Jason Jonkman & Amy Robertson & Nicole Mendoza & Cameron Brown & Christos Galinos & Henrik Stiesdal, 2021. "Modeling the TetraSpar Floating Offshore Wind Turbine Foundation as a Flexible Structure in OrcaFlex and OpenFAST," Energies, MDPI, vol. 14(23), pages 1-14, November.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:rensus:v:212:y:2025:i:c:s1364032124009572. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/wps/find/journaldescription.cws_home/600126/description#description .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.