Search

Recent advances in numerical modeling, satellite data, and coastal processes, together with the rapid evolution of CMEMS products and the increasing pressures on coastal zones, suggest the timeliness of extending such products toward the coast. The CEASELESS EU H2020 project combines Sentinel and in-situ data with high-resolution models to predict coastal hydrodynamics at a variety of scales, according to stakeholder requirements. These predictions explicitly introduce land discharges into coastal oceanography, addressing local conditioning, assimilation memory and anisotropic error metrics taking into account the limited size of coastal domains. This article presents and discusses the advances achieved by CEASELESS in exploring the performance of coastal models, considering model resolution and domain scales, and assessing error generation and propagation. The project has also evaluated how underlying model uncertainties can be treated to comply with stakeholder requirements for a variety of applications, from storm-induced risks to aquaculture, from renewable energy to water quality. This has led to the refinement of a set of demonstrative applications, supported by a software environment able to provide met-ocean data on demand. The article ends with some remarks on the scientific, technical and application limits for CMEMS-based coastal products and how these products may be used to drive the extension of CMEMS toward the coast, promoting a wider uptake of CMEMS-based predictions.

Author Posting. © American Geophysical Union, 2013. This article is posted here by permission of American Geophysical Union for personal use, not for redistribution. The definitive version was published in Journal of Geophysical Research: Oceans 118 (2013): 5844–5857, doi:10.1002/jgrc.20403., This study characterizes the seasonal cycle of the Catalan inner-shelf circulation using observations and complementary numerical results. The relation between seasonal circulation and forcing mechanisms is explored through the depth-averaged momentum balance, for the period between May 2010 and April 2011, when velocity observations were partially available. The monthly-mean along-shelf flow is mainly controlled by the along-shelf pressure gradient and by surface and bottom stresses. During summer, fall, and winter, the along-shelf momentum balance is dominated by the barotropic pressure gradient and local winds. During spring, both wind stress and pressure gradient act in the same direction and are compensated by bottom stress. In the cross-shelf direction the dominant forces are in geostrophic balance, consistent with dynamic altimetry data., The research leading to these results has received funding from the European Community’s Seventh Framework Programme (FP7/2007/2013) under grant agreement 242284 (Field_ac project)., 2014-04-25

The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change reports reflect evolving attitudes in adapting to sea-level rise by taking a systems approach and recognizing that multiple responses exist to achieve a less hazardous coast.

This paper studies climatic drivers (air and water temperature, precipitation rates, river discharge, sea level and storm patterns) in four Mediterranean regions: the Catalan-Valencia Coast (Spain), the Oran (Algeria) and Gabe`s (Tunisia) Gulfs and the western Nile Delta (Egypt). The paper also considers the potential hazards that these drivers can induce. It first analyses climatic trends in the drivers, taking into account the available time series of recorded and simulated meteo-oceanographic data from different sources. Next, it presents the general framework to assess biogeophysical hazards (flooding, erosion, droughts and water quality), followed by a simple and yet robust evaluation of those hazards for the four studied coastal sites. Assuming climate change projections under different scenarios and considering the observed trends in drivers, the resulting erosion rates due to sea-level rise and wave storm effects have been estimated. The Nile and Ebro Deltas, together with the Oran Gulf, are more vulnerable than the Gulfs of Valencia and Gabe`s. Regarding water quality in terms of (a) precipitation and dissolved oxygen in the water column and (b) sea surface temperature, the results show that the most vulnerable zones for the projected conditions (a) are the Gulfs of Oran, Valencia and Gabe`s, while the Nile Delta is the region where the decrease in water quality will be less pronounced. For the projected conditions (b), the most vulnerable zone is the Ebro Delta, while the impact in the other three cases will be smaller and of comparable magnitude. Finally, the overall future impact of these hazards (associated to climatic change) in the four sites is discussed in comparative terms, deriving some conclusions.

Ocean processes do not take place in isolation but interact with one another to form a complex system. This paper focuses on these processes by using and developing the POLCOMS-WAM model. The Stokes’ drift and radiation stress effect on currents have been included, following state of the art formulations. The system is evaluated in the NW Mediterranean and the Irish Sea. Due to oceanographic properties of the Catalan coast, currents are typically less than 20 cm/s and therefore the modification of waves due to the effect of currents is minimal. However, the wave induced currents, mainly caused by enhanced wind drag due to waves, produce a current of about the same magnitude as the ambient one and thus become an important source of mass transport. For the Irish Sea an improvement of storm surge modelling by considering a wave modified wind stress is presented.

In this study, the ability of two data-based approaches in analysing and modelling beach morphology and wave data at Duck, North Carolina, USA, was investigated. Dynamic Harmonic Regression (DHR) was used to analyse bed elevation and wave height time series in order to identify the long-term trends and dominant periodic components characterising the morphological changes and wave climate at Duck. A linear Transfer Function (TF) modelling approach was used to relate bed elevation time series to nearshore wave height time series with the aim of investigating the suitability of such a simple model in predicting the longer-term morphological changes. The DHR analysis showed multi-scale variability of the beach profile and was in good agreement with observations made in previous studies. The linear TF model showed limited capability with only a small proportion of the data being described by the model.