Suitability of monopile and jacket foundations for contemporary offshore wind turbines

Abstract

The increasing popularity of offshore wind turbines (OWTs) as a source of renewable energy has attracted a lot of interests from governments, researchers and industry. The construction of these facilities offshore are even more challenging in terms of designing/choosing suitable foundations to support them. Different foundation types have been specified for different conditions, including various water depth ranges and turbine ratings. This paper presents a global trend of existing OWTs supported on monopile and jacket foundations in relation to these two factors. This trend is properly defined in order to serve as a guide in selecting the appropriate foundation for a particular OWT.