Marine current turbines are still in their infancy with many devices at the development stage. Studies are often carried out using small scale laboratory experiments in flumes, towing tanks and numerical simulations to investigate the wakes and performance of scale marine current turbines. However, the characteristics of the inflow turbulence used in such studies is often not fully considered. Tidal flows are highly turbulent with a broad range of eddy sizes and intensities. So differences are expected when predictions of array energy yields are made from towing tanks studies with zero turbulence. This work considers the effects of turbulent eddy size on the thrust and wake behind a porous disc rotor simulator commonly used to represent marine current turbines in small scale experiments. The results show an increase in thrust coefficient with increasing length scale and a corresponding reduction in velocity deficit in the wake. These findings have implications to array special planning and hence energy yields.
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