Changes in beach shoreline due to sea level rise and waves under climate change scenarios: application to the Balearic Islands (western Mediterranean)
This work assesses the impacts in reshaping coastlines as a result of sea level rise and changes in wave climate. The methodology proposed combines the SWAN and SWASH wave models to resolve the wave processes from deep waters up to the swash zone in two micro-tidal sandy beaches in Mallorca isla...
Main Authors: | , , , , |
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Format: | Article |
Language: | English |
Published: |
Copernicus Publications
2017-07-01
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Series: | Natural Hazards and Earth System Sciences |
Online Access: | https://www.nat-hazards-earth-syst-sci.net/17/1075/2017/nhess-17-1075-2017.pdf |
Summary: | This work assesses the impacts in reshaping coastlines as a result
of sea level rise and changes in wave climate. The methodology proposed
combines the SWAN and SWASH wave models to resolve the wave processes from
deep waters up to the swash zone in two micro-tidal sandy beaches in Mallorca
island, western Mediterranean. In a first step, the modelling approach has
been validated with observations from wave gauges and from the shoreline
inferred from video monitoring stations, showing a good agreement between
them. Afterwards, the modelling set-up has been applied to the 21st century
sea level and wave projections under two different climate scenarios, representative concentration pathways RCP45
and RCP85. Sea level projections have been retrieved from state-of-the-art
regional estimates, while wave projections were obtained from regional
climate models. Changes in the shoreline position have been explored under
mean and extreme wave conditions. Our results indicate that the studied
beaches would suffer a coastal retreat between 7 and up to 50 m, equivalent
to half of the present-day aerial beach surface, under the climate scenarios
considered. |
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ISSN: | 1561-8633 1684-9981 |