Motion compensation of opean-ocean acoustic Doppler velocimeter measurements for offshore turbulence assessment

This study presents an approach for calculating open ocean turbulence characteristics using data collected from an acoustic Doppler velocimeter (ADV) with an integrated inertial measurement unit (IMU) suspended from a surface vessel. These turbulence characteristics are important for marine renewable energy applications where turbulence impacts device loadings and power productions, as well as underwater laser communication where turbulence diffracts and spreads laser beams. This study presents new approaches for filtering ADV data with high percentages of “bad” data and removing both high and low frequency motions from collected data. These techniques are shown to create improved turbulence spectra for several measurement locations.