Clemson University TigerPrints All Theses Theses 12-2015 DESIGN AND ANALYSIS OF FOUNDATION FOR ONSHORE TALL WIND TURBINES Shweta Shrestha Clemson University,
[email protected] Follow this and additional works at: https://tigerprints.clemson.edu/all_theses Part of the Civil Engineering Commons Recommended Citation Shrestha, Shweta, "DESIGN AND ANALYSIS OF FOUNDATION FOR ONSHORE TALL WIND TURBINES" (2015). All Theses. 2291. https://tigerprints.clemson.edu/all_theses/2291 This Thesis is brought to you for free and open access by the Theses at TigerPrints. It has been accepted for inclusion in All Theses by an authorized administrator of TigerPrints. For more information, please contact
[email protected]. DESIGN AND ANALYSIS OF FOUNDATION FOR ONSHORE TALL WIND TURBINES A Thesis Presented to the Graduate School of Clemson University In Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree Master of Science Civil Engineering by Shweta Shrestha December 2015 Accepted by: Dr. Nadarajah Ravichandran, Committee Chair Dr. Ronald D. Andrus Dr. Qiushi Chen ABSTRACT Wind turbines play a vital role in producing sustainable and clean energy to fulfill the growing energy needs. Energy generated from wind turbines being more sustainable and cost effective, many countries have taken a major step to develop wind turbines with large capacity. There has been a significant reduction in the levelized cost of energy (LCOE) since the 1980’s from the development of larger wind farms and from consistent performance improvements of wind turbine components. The power generation capacity of wind turbines has increased significantly over the years with the use of taller towers. When the tower height increases, the loads on the foundation increase and the foundation becomes significantly larger.