NATARISE · Natural and Artificially Influenced Swash-Groundwater Interactions Experiments
FP7 — People (Marie Curie Actions)
- Duration
- 2009-03-01 → 2011-02-28
- EU contribution
- €158,300
- Participants
- 1
- Scheme
- MC-IEF
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Results in brief
Natural and Artificially Influenced Swash-Groundwater Interactions Experiments
Effective management of European coastal erosion is one of the major stakes of the 21st century. The EU EUROSION report (2004) underlines that all European coastal states are to some extent affected by coastal erosion. Erosion of sandy beaches is exemplified by the displacement of the shoreline, which is located on a relatively steep section of the beach profile, extending shoreward from the low tide level to the berm, called the beachface. Since the 1990s, methods to fight coastal erosion have largely shifted from “hard engineering” to “soft engineering”. One potential soft-engineering measure to promote beachface sedimentation is known as the Beach Dewatering System (BDS), based on the artificial regression of the beach groundwater. The applied-research question underlying the NATARISE project is why a BDS leads to sedimentation. It was envisaged that an improved understanding of the interaction between swash motion and groundwater was crucial to answer this question. As the groundwater in a beach is actively drained, this will alter infiltration/exfiltration speeds of water into/out of the beach. This, in turn, will affect sediment transport processes, possibly leading to beach sedimentation. Within this context, the NATARISE project was based on two major objectives: 1. To investigate swash/groundwater interactions between contrasting European beaches; and 2. To understand how BDS promotes beachface sedimentation, while investigating the instantaneous effects of the drainage influence over swash in/exfiltration speeds and volumes. To reach these objectives, NATARISE was separated into 4 work-packages: 1. Influence of tide over beachface morphodynamics of meso-macrotidal beaches. 2. Influence of short waves / long waves over beachface morphodynamic of microtidal beaches. 3. Impact of beach dewatering systems over instantaneous beachface morphodynamics of a microtidal reflective beach. 4. Modelling of natural and artificially influenced beachface morphodynamics of contrasting beaches. During the actual project, the researcher placed considerable effort on work-packages 1 and 2 (i.e., objective 1). The field measurements belonging to work-package 2 required far more preparation time than originally anticipated. Also, the data was more noisy that envisaged and thus more work had to be spent on data validation. As a result, work on packages 3 and 4 (i.e. objective 2) was not carried out.
Data: CORDIS, © European Union
Project objective
Effective management of coastal erosion is a major stakes for the European Union. In a context of global warming and overpopulation of the coasts, the overall purpose of this project is to improve understanding of the hydrosedimentary processes affecting the instantaneous land-sea interface (the beachface), at the origin of an erosion or accretion of a coast. The objectives are: (1) To study the impact of the various types of marine waves on the swash/beach groundwater/sediment transit interactions, starting from experiments carried out on 4 beaches representative of the Europe’s sandy coasts (North Sea, Atlantic and Mediterranean beaches). (2) To investigate the instantaneous effects of the drainage influence over swash in/exfiltration speeds and volume in order to improve the understanding of the operation of an innovative and promising - but still badly understood - method of fight against coastal erosion: the Beach Dewatering Systems. Response to these objectives will be made by the use of innovative experimental field methods (measurement of swash in/exfiltration speeds, use of a BDS for artificially generating erosion/accretion conditions), and by the data processing and analysis within the host institution (Coastal Group - University of Utrecht), highly recognized in the field. The obtained results will allow a better understanding of the physical aspects of the swash infiltration/exfiltration parameters, and to render BDS applicable to the greatest number of sites. Skills and knowledge acquired by Adrien Lambert (the applicant) within the framework of this project as its cooperation with the host (Associate Prof. Gerben Ruessink) will contribute to the quality of the results, like improving and widening the field of expertise of the applicant for his future recruitment. This project will contribute finally to the radiation of European research by allowing a significant advance within the field of soft engineering shoreline stabilization methods.
Original text from CORDIS.
Participants
- UNIVERSITEIT UTRECHT · UtrechtCoordinatorNetherlands
Links
Data: CORDIS, © European Union