Accuracy of Sediment Flux Computations in Tidally Driven Simulations
Publication: Journal of Waterway, Port, Coastal, and Ocean Engineering
Volume 133, Issue 5
Abstract
Tidal asymmetry, generated by nonlinear shallow water processes, controls to a large extent the long-term fate of noncohesive sediments in estuaries and lagoons. Since the accurate reproduction of this asymmetry is still a challenge for hydrodynamic models, it is important to quantify the effect of errors in the representation of tidal asymmetry on tidally averaged sediment fluxes. The effect of the accuracy in the amplitude and phase in the tidal velocity on the errors in the evaluation of residual sediment transport was analyzed analytically. Results show that errors of the order of 20% in velocity amplitude can lead to sediment transport errors on the order of 100%. Phase errors lead to smaller, but non-negligible, errors in sediment transport. Simple expressions to estimate these errors are provided.
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Acknowledgments
This work was partially funded by the Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia, the Programa Operacional “Ciência, Tecnologia, Inovação” and FEDER, project “Sand transport in surface waters: An uncertainty analysis.” The writer is grateful to Dr. A. Oliveira, Dr. Demirbilek, and two anonymous reviewers for critical reviews of the manuscript and useful suggestions.
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Information
Published In
Journal of Waterway, Port, Coastal, and Ocean Engineering
Volume 133 • Issue 5 • September 2007
Pages: 377 - 380
Copyright
© 2007 ASCE.
History
Received: Mar 3, 2005
Accepted: Nov 28, 2005
Published online: Sep 1, 2007
Published in print: Sep 2007
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