Optimization of offshore wind farm power cable routing

Up to now methods to optimize cable route layout are only based on a flat seabed and do not take the seabed dynamics into account (Jenkins et al., 2013; Morelissen et al., 2003). The result of this approach is that power cable coverage is not guaranteed over wind farm design lifetime. Cable optimization is mainly executed based on shortest routes instead of cost reduction over the entire design lifespan. The aim of this research is to develop a Matlab based tool, which optimizes power cable route design based on expected morphological behaviour in the design lifetime of an offshore wind farm.