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Faculty of Engineering and Applied Science

Ocean and naval engineering research facilities

Introduction



Introduction

The Faculty of Engineering and Applied Science at Memorial University offers large, well-equipped facilities and a dedicated technical support staff. Students and researchers can access 4,500 square meters of labs and all research is fully supported by a comprehensive computer-aided engineering centre. Facilities also include a 60-meter towing / wave tank and an ice structures lab with cold rooms and highly specialized testing equipment.

Research in ocean engineering is complemented by several research groups on campus. The faculty's Ocean Engineering Research Centre (OERC) is involved in research, development and consulting in most areas of ocean engineering including the offshore and naval architecture industries. Scale model experiments, numerical modeling, software development and structural testing are some of the activities within the OERC. In addition, the National Research Council's Institute for Marine Dynamics (IMD) on Memorial's campus contains a 90-meter ice tank (one of the largest in the world), a 200-meter towing tank and a 75×32 meter ocean engineering basin capable of replicating complex sea states. As well, the Centre for Cold Ocean Resources Engineering (C-CORE) has extensive equipment and facilities to conduct major field-oriented research and has an in-house centrifuge.

Ocean Engineering Research Centre (OERC)

The Ocean Engineering Research Centre was established in 1969 with the initial financial support of the National Research Council of Canada through a negotiated development grant. It is an integral part of Memorial's Faculty of Engineering and Applied Science. This Centre became a focus of the effort to establish ocean engineering as a new research and educational field in Canada. Today Memorial University is the only university in Canada that offers the B.Eng. degree in Ocean and Naval Architectural Engineering and the M. Eng. and PhD degrees in ocean engineering. The Centre has offices and facilities in the S.J. Carew Building on the north side of the St. John's campus. Facilities available to students in some of these programmes include a 60 m towing/wave tank and the international class facilities of the Institute for Marine Dynamics of the National Research Council of Canada. These latter facilities include one of the largest ice tanks in the world at the present time.

With more than 25 years experience, OERC is involved in research, development, and consulting with application to most aspects of ocean engineering, including the offshore and naval architectural engineering industries. We aim for excellence in research through our industrial collaborations and through publications in major international journals each year.

The main areas of interest in the Centre are: marine hydrodynamics and wave structure interaction; sea ice mechanics, iceberg and ice structure interaction; risk analysis in offshore systems; naval architectural aspects including vessel motions, propulsion and small craft problems; ocean monitoring, acoustics, geotechnology and instrumentation.

Facilities

  • A 58m towing/wave tank with random wave generation capability
  • structures laboratory capable of carrying out static and dynamic tests using a number of hydraulic actuators with a capacity up to 2.7 MN
  • cold rooms used for ice mechanics testing
  • deep tank for acoustic work
  • model fabrication, welding, machining shops (managed by the Technical Services Division of the university)
  • 500 kN biaxial (axial load and triaxial confining pressure) closed-loop servohydraulic material test system including a four-column load frame and triaxial cell pressure intensifier housed in a cold room for ice mechanics testing
  • access to the facilities of the National Research Council Canada Institute for Ocean Technology. These facilities include an ice tank used in the experimental study of interaction between ice and ships or offshore structures. At 90m x 12m x 3m, the tank is the longest of its kind in the world. The clearwater towing tank is 200m x 12m x 7m and is equipped with a towing carriage with a maximum speed of 10m/s and a wavemaker capable of producing waves up to 1m in height. The offshore engineering and seakeeping basin measures 75m x 32m x 3.5m. A total of 192 individual wavemaker units produce multi-directional short-crested waves.

Projects

  • Ship Structures Research
  • Ice Contact Research
  • New Structural Testing Facilities


Contact information

Brian Veitch
Director
Ocean Engineering Research Centre
Faculty of Engineering and Applied Science
St. John's, NF, Canada, A1B 3X5
Telephone: (709)737-8970
Fax: (709)737-2116

Risks to Offshore Personnel and Installations

The initial focus of this work was on the safety of the Escape-Evacuation-Rescue process during an emergency abandonment of an offshore petroleum installation. The aim was to establish the performance capabilities of different types of evacuation systems over a range of weather conditions, from calm water up to storms. In addition to testing in a range of weather conditions, the evacuation systems were evaluated in different configurations. So far, model scale experimental campaigns have been carried out (at the Institute for Ocean Technology) for conventional twin falls davit launched lifeboats, the same system modified by the addition of a flexible boom, and free fall boats. More recent work performed by Dr. Brian Veitch and his team has evaluated the performance of evacuation systems in ice-covered waters, and work in progress is focused on rafts. In order to quantify the systems' capabilities, performance measures have also been proposed and refined. These may have particular utility in the context of goal based regulatory regimes. This program has expanded recently to incorporate numerical modeling and simulation of evacuation systems, the role of human factors in operations, and training elements. It has also been extended to include broader safety assessment of offshore platforms, particularly in terms of major hazards and associated risk management. This is a major research program and involves several co-operating organizations, researchers, technicians, and students.

Offshore and Underwater Vehicles Design Laboratory

The oil and gas industry on the East Coast of Canada is the key to the economic life of Newfoundland and Labrador. Ensuring that the exploitation is done in an environmentally safe and practical manner is critical to the development and sustainability of the industry.

Dr. Neil Bose's vision as Canada Research Chair in Offshore and Underwater Vehicles Design is to build strongly interrelated research teams in both underwater vehicle design and offshore vehicle design. These teams address issues for specific projects that include the use of autonomous underwater vehicles for offshore environmental risk engineering; the study of wakes from dynamical positioning thrusters for floating offshore platforms; hydrodynamic performance of riser systems in deep water including high mode vibration, clashing and their effects on riser fatigue; the design of underwater vehicles for marine mining and dredging; and marine propulsion.


Structures Laboratory

The maritime and offshore industries are facing many new challenges and opportunities in the area of structures. Environmental and safety concerns keep rising, even as the offshore industry moves into deeper water and more challenging seas. The offshore industry is adopting increasingly rigorous structural design methods, based on more sophisticated knowledge of the full range of structural behaviour. Similar developments are underway in the world's shipping industry. Owners and regulators keep seeking improved standards for structural design, to mitigate risk and maximize capability. Both industries want to be able to better understand and develop ship and offshore structures. New research and new analysis tools are enabling more sophisticated and accurate design predictions, as these industries develop new platform technologies.

Dr. Claude Daley, together with others in the faculty and the Institute for Ocean Technology have a series of research initiatives underway that will provide the groundwork for a variety of modern approaches in ship and offshore structural design and assessment.