Wave Attenuation Performance of Emergent Reef-Type Breakwaters and Oyster Shell Bags
Publication: ASCE Inspire 2023
ABSTRACT
Living shorelines for coastal protection have favored engineering with reef-forming bivalves, such as oysters, because of their capacity to form dense living breakwater structures that provide both coastal protection and ecological benefits. Various constructed oyster reef (COR) designs have emerged, and investigations of their wave attenuation performance are needed to validate designs and compare design performance. The wave attenuation properties of (1) a novel emergent COR, called “QuickReef”; and (2) oyster shell bag breakwaters were measured in field experiments across coastal North Carolina. Results demonstrate that the emergent reef-type breakwaters performed comparably to oyster shell bag breakwaters in terms of wave attenuation. Wave attenuation is maximized at low tide when freeboard is the greatest. Field data were also compared to an existing empirical formulation for predicting wave attenuation of emergent rubble-mound breakwaters. Results demonstrate that wave attenuation performance of reef-type breakwaters and oyster shell bag breakwaters are not well predicted by existing breakwater theory, suggesting a need for empirical formulations for living shoreline-type breakwaters to inform effective design.
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Information & Authors
Information
Published In
ASCE Inspire 2023
Pages: 564 - 573
History
Published online: Nov 14, 2023
ASCE Technical Topics:
- Breakwaters
- Coastal engineering
- Coastal protection structures
- Coasts, oceans, ports, and waterways engineering
- Ecosystems
- Environmental engineering
- Fluid mechanics
- Hydrologic engineering
- Ocean waves
- Shell structures
- Shoreline protection
- Shores
- Structural engineering
- Structures (by type)
- Water and water resources
- Water waves
- Wave attenuation
- Waves (fluid mechanics)
Authors
Metrics & Citations
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