COASTAL PROCESSES AND DYNAMICS

Strategic Goal #1: Identify and understand coastal processes dominating the South Carolina coast as they affect shoreline change, fisheries recruitment, and mineral resources management, and are influenced by sea level rise.

Coastal and marine commerce depend upon sound coastal and ocean engineering. In turn, efficient and safe marine engineering design depends upon understanding coastal and sea-floor sediment dynamics. These physical processes - beach erosion and accretion, salt-marsh migration and erosion, tidal inlet migration, sediment transport, coastal and oceanic water circulation patterns, wind-driven wave effects - can favorably or adversely impact these important coastal features and human activities in these dynamic environments. Investigating possible scientific, management and policy solutions to problems associated with these forces requires basic studies upon which these solutions can be developed.

The Consortium’s objectives under this strategic goal are to:

1. Generate and analyze information on the major physical factors (e.g., beach and salt marsh erosion and accretion, weather events, river runoff, sand budgets) affecting coastal resources, especially tidal inlets, tidal shoals, and beach maintenance, nourishment, and rehabilitation.

2. Evaluate and extend coastal process information and make it available to coastal constituents, coastal resource managers, and municipal leaders for use in decision-making.

3. Gather and, where necessary, generate and disseminate information on natural forces of hurricanes and storms, coastal erosion, and sea level rise.

FY06-08 Priorities

In recent years, the effects of natural sedimentary processes on human activities along the coast have become increasingly expensive to address. For example, sediments deposited in navigation channels and harbors require hundreds of millions of dollars for dredging each year. Likewise, great effort and expense is spent attempting to locate adequate sources of sand for nourishment activities.

Estuarine (non-beachfront) shoreline changes as affected by a multitude of anthropogenic and natural processes are poorly understood. Salt marsh “edges” appear to be affected by erosional processes due both to natural riverine/estuarine and anthropogenic influences. Questions the coastal management community is asking include: Are we losing or gaining salt marsh? What are the predictions for the future? What management actions should be considered to mitigate any expected loses?

Recent scientific and technological advancements make this an opportune time to undertake fundamental research on coastal sediment transport processes and shoreline/salt marsh “edge” changes. While the ultimate goal is to be able to predict physical changes to complex, large-scale nearshore environments based on time-dependent dynamic models, experiments on smaller, simpler systems over shorter time scales are preferred.

The Consortium is interested in receiving proposals in the following areas:

• Continuing studies on tidal and wind-induced currents that (a) quantify the relative contributions of winds, waves, and tides to longshore and cross-shore currents, (b) determine the vertical structure of velocity within wave and current boundary layers, (c) develop models of tide and wind-forced nearshore current and sediment transport, and (d) test and apply the models to sediment transport and erosion “hot-spots” in South Carolina.

• Examine and develop innovative techniques for locating and identifying cost-effective, low-impact sediment supplies for nourishment use.

• Establish and evaluate model criteria necessary to determine the effectiveness and efficacy of beach nourishment programs.

• Estuarine (non-beachfront) shoreline changes as affected by a multitude of anthropogenic and natural processes are poorly understood. Research is necessary to examine the trends related to estuarine shoreline change and develop and test alternative salt marsh bank erosion mitigation techniques, including an analysis of current mitigation alternatives.

 

Strategic Goal 2

 

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