- Local to regional modelling of tidal currents and tidal energy resource assessment.
Our group has been working in collaboration with national and international teams within a number of projects, including the recently created “Mexican Centre for Innovation in Renewable Energy – Ocean”; to develop state-of-the-art tools and train highly qualified human resources in the characterisation and assessment of renewable energy resources, environmental impacts, and technology developments, amongst others. In this project, we are developing a number of different lines of research. For example, the intern may be characterizing the marine environment in meso and macro-tidal environments, using case studies for the Gulf of California. Another option is to analyse the dynamics of tidal and residual currents, including wind-driven circulation, at local to regional scales. A third possibility would be to analyse the environmental impacts of tidal energy arrays placed in strategic sites. Finally, a fourth option could be to analyse tidal resources with techno-economic and socio-ecological constraints.
The student may pursue a similar project on wind pattern analysis and wind energy resource assessments (see project 4). - CFD modelling for wind, marine, or river energy conversion turbines
This is a numerical modelling project, where the student will address fundamental questions in fluid-structure interactions. The main energy indicators will be the theoretical power density and energy conversion efficiency. The aim will to study how device geometry or environmental conditions, for example, affect these energy conversion indicators. - Regional circulation models in marginal seas, small-scale circulation and morphodynamics in semi-enclosed water bodies and coastal regions, and coastal erosion and inundation under extreme events
In this project, the student will analyse the regional or local circulation patterns in marginal seas or coastal semi-enclosed areas such as coastal lagoons, straits, tidal inlets, inundation and coastal erosion in reef-protected areas, or shallow macro-tidal regions, amongst others. Wave action is included when relevant, in particular as a driving force under extreme storm conditions. - Coastal and regional dispersion mechanisms with Eulerian modelling frameworks and passive tracers
This extends the circulation models to particle dispersion applications, for instance red tide dynamics or contaminant dispersion. The regional and local model output data is analysed to determine convergence/divergence patterns and passive tracer dynamics at different spatio-temporal scales. - Multi-scale Evaluation of Wind Atlases (MEWA)
A wind atlas provides suitable data for evaluating the potential wind power output from wind farms. However, the success of wind-energy implementation directly depends on the quantification of the uncertainty of wind resource predictions. For example, a 1% wind speed error can easily result in a 2% error in the estimate of the energy output, which for a 200 MW wind farm corresponds to approx. 1.5—3 million USD in revenue. In order to decrease such uncertainty and for strategic geospatial planning of wind farms in a region or country, a wind atlas is necessary. In this project, we will evaluate geographical information from a number of sources and assess current levels of uncertainty energy production estimates for a selection of potential development sites in Mexico - Statistical meteorological variables for renewable energy resource assessments, based on meteorological monitoring stations and WRF data analysis
The purpose of this project if two-fold. First, we will use long-term time series data from meteorological monitoring stations to analyse the statistical characteristics of different environmental variables, such as wind speed, sun irradiance, humidity and precipitation variable; in some cases, we will use high-resolution data from model simulation predictions as output data for the statistical analyses. Second, we will use the statistical information to evaluate renewable energy resources such as wind or solar energy, based on theoretical power density for wind speed and solar irradiance variability at multiple scales. In this second part, we will attempt to evaluate the impact of cloudiness and storminess on renewable energy resources. - Variability and long-term patterns in modelled and remotely sensed biophysical variables using linear and non-linear pattern analysis methodologies
This Project focuses on seasonal and interannual variability and long-term pattern analysis for modelled and remotely observed biophysical oceanographic variables. The student will use in-house developed codes in Matlab and Python, as well as established linear and nonlinear pattern analysis methods such as PCA, CCA, SSA, MSSA, or neural networks, amongst others. - Physics Dynamics Coupling
Dynamical cores of the atmosphere separate the solution of the resolved flow (dynamics core) and parametrizations (clouds, radiation, boundary layer, etc). These then need to be coupled and several options exists. This project attempts to investigate this coupling and to infer which moths are better than others, develop testing strategies and lay down metrics for comparison. - Multi-scale Modelling
From RANS to Coastal/Ocean models. This projects aims at developing a continuous simulation framework based on ESMF to couple multi resolution models.
investigación impulsada por la curiosidad