Investigation of sea current velocity and power potential in the North Aegean sea

Abstract

This study aims to assess the marine hydrodynamics and the potential power of sea currents by simulating the probability distribution functions of the sea current velocity values. For this aim, hourly sea current velocity and direction data measured from the & Ccedil;anakkale (Turkey) measurement station in the North Aegean Sea were used. These data were measured during two separate periods: January 1 - March 24, 2017, and March 25 - December 31, 2019. First, the vertical structure of the sea currents up to 50 m depth was determined. Then, frequency distributions of hourly sea current velocities were modeled by using the Weibull, Rayleigh, and Exponential probability density functions. According to the results obtained at 5, 10, 20, 30, 40, and 50 m depths below the sea surface level, the annual sea current velocity was 28.8 +/- 0.395, 26.1 +/- 0.388, 19.4 +/- 0.339, 16.1 +/- 0.324, 17.5 +/- 0.344, and 24.7 +/- 0.622 cm/s, respectively, in this sea. Furthermore, the annual sea current power potential was calculated as 30.0, 25.4, 15.0, 12.2, 15.0, and 88.2 W/m2 for 5, 10, 20, 30, 40, and 50 m depths, respectively. The results demonstrated that the Weibull distribution model was the best fit for the sea current velocity in this sea.