Operating in waves

We all know ships operate the majority of their working lives (~80%) in waves as opposed to calm water. But where can I find literature to back up this claim? Or how can I prove this myself?

 

The minute you leave the protection of a bay, so unless you spend your time navigating rivers and lakes you will see waves and storms. Planet earth is all about weather. So I would your chance of running into some waves is over 95%. The question is, what constitute bad weather for your location and boat.

 

Wave exist in rivers, bays and every sort of puddle too, so it's relative term and a state of being if you're a vessel.

 

Wacky question, looking for written confirmation of something "we all know". Look in the manual of common sense.

 

For an academic project, you could start with buoy data from http://www.ndbc.noaa.gov/ Take the NOAA annual data text files under history from buoys along a route and put into a spreadsheet.