Ice due to wave induced droplets must be considered in all operations in the Arctic. The operational challenges are related to human life, structural damage, control and stability of vessels and stationary sea objects.
The ICELOAD application addresses the need for models that have more prediction power than what is available today. Uncertainties in input parameters in current models are as large as the order of 1000 when it comes to the droplet source (droplet mass per event). The droplet size is normally used in current models as a free adjustment factor. These quantities must be predicted in order to realistically simulate ice loads.
The ICELOAD application addresses the topic "Research related to challenges, resulting from ice and the icing of offshore petroleum installations and equipment".
The aim is to provide methods to obtain the missing information, under both static (fixed construction) or dynamic (floating construction) situations, as well as to provide critical validation data that will be made available to the scientific and industrial communities. The numerical methods and multiscale simulation tool that is to be developed will be made available to all possible users as Open Source software. This allows adaption of the software and models by future users to answer to even larger variety of ice-related challenges in the Arctic.