Surrogate-based structure layout optimization of the electrothermal de-icing system for the superstructure of a polar ship

Abstract The electrothermal deicing system (EDS) of a polar ship uses the electric trace heating technology to prevent icing on the upper facilities, ensuring the normal operation of polar ships and the safety of personnel in extreme polar environments. Although the existing electrothermal deicing technology has made significant advancements, there are issues such as improper structural configuration and mismatched heating capacity. These problems may lead to poor anti-icing and deicing effects and high-power consumption for EDS. To address these problems, a high-fidelity finite element model (FEM) of the EDS is established and the corresponding grid-independence verification is performed. To achieve an efficient design optimization based on the high-fidelity FEM, performance surrogate models for the EDS are established using suitable construction methods selected by accuracy comparison. The surrogate models take the performance indicators of the EDS (the maximum temperature difference and the average temperature) as the output functions of the spacing sizes of the U-shaped carbon fiber heating wire. Optimization objective is to maximize the melting temperature, minimize the temperature difference, and reduce power consumption. The optimization results show that the anti-icing and deicing performance of the polar ship EDS improves significantly by more than 10% by properly configuring the carbon fiber heating wire layout.