Erasmus Mundus Msc Programme Coastal and Marine Engineering and Management Comem Feasibility Study of a Coupled Numerical Model for Longshore Sediment Transport and Beach Response

................................................................................................................................... i ACKNOWLEDGMENTS ............................................................................................................ ii LIST OF FIGURES ...................................................................................................................... v LIST OF TABLES ...................................................................................................................... vii LIST OF ACRONYMS AND ABBREVIATIONS ................................................................. viii LIST OF SYMBOLS ................................................................................................................... ix 1 GENERAL INTRODUCTION ............................................................................................ 1 1.1 Background ..................................................................................................................... 1 1.2 Problem Description ....................................................................................................... 2 1.3 Aim and Objectives ......................................................................................................... 3 1.4 Structure of this Dissertation ........................................................................................... 4 2 LITERATURE REVIEW ..................................................................................................... 5 2.1 Coastal Environment ....................................................................................................... 5 2.2 Temporal and Spatial Scales ........................................................................................... 6 2.3 Shoreline Management ................................................................................................... 8 2.4 Sediment Transport for Sandy Beaches .......................................................................... 9 3 MODEL COMPONENTS ...................................................................................................18 3.1 One-line Model ..............................................................................................................18 3.2 Cross-shore Profile Model .............................................................................................24 3.3 Linking Platform ............................................................................................................32 3.4 Models in Pipistrelle ......................................................................................................35 3.5 Model Comparison .........................................................................................................36 4 METHODOLOGIES AND MODEL COUPLING ...........................................................38 4.1 Methodological Steps and Model Coupling Approaches ...............................................38 4.2 Key Problems .................................................................................................................40 4.3 Drift Interpolation Module .............................................................................................41 4.4 Vector-To-Scalar Module ..............................................................................................46 4.5 Profile Orientation Updating Module ............................................................................48 4.6 Final Composition of the Coupled Model ......................................................................54 5 MODEL TESTS AND DISCUSSIONS ..............................................................................57