Sonika Bagchi ’23

Major

Physics

Project Title

The Oceanic Wakes of Offshore Wind Turbines

Certificate(s): Applied and Computational Mathematics, Finance

The research agenda for this project was to study wind waves and turbulence related to offshore wind-turbine farms. The presence of offshore wind farms can result in sediment displacement and modified water turbulence that can negatively impact marine life. In order to study and mitigate this, I first analyzed wind-generated water waves produced in the lab by conducting various analyses to study the development of turbulence. I then created simple visualizations of waves and studied their wavenumber-frequency spectra. This project was extremely exciting for me because it was my first opportunity to learn about fluid dynamics and turbulence. Additionally, in terms of technical skills, I got to really strengthen my abilities in the programming language Python. Finally, I think this project will affect my choice of projects in the future, such as my junior independent research. I would like to continue working with sustainability research or, at the very least, working with computer simulation.

* This internship is connected to the HMEI Climate and Energy Challenge project, “The Atmospheric and Oceanic Wakes of Offshore Wind Turbines and Their Effects on Local Marine Environments.”



Internship Year

2021

Project Category

Innovation and a New Energy Future

Organization(s)

Deike Lab, Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering, Princeton University

Mentor(s)

Luc Deike, Assistant Professor of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering and the High Meadows Environmental Institute; Jiarong Wu, Ph.D. candidate, Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering