Error Estimates to Smooth Solutions of Runge--Kutta Discontinuous Galerkin Methods for Scalar Conservation Laws

Abstract

In this paper we study the error estimates to sufficiently smooth solutions of scalar conservation laws for Runge--Kutta discontinuous Galerkin (RKDG) methods, where the time discretization is the second order explicit total variation diminishing (TVD) Runge--Kutta method. Error estimates for the $\mathbb{P}^1$ (piecewise linear) elements are obtained under the usual CFL condition $\tau\leq \gamma h$ for general nonlinear conservation laws in one dimension and for linear conservation laws in multiple space dimensions, where h and $\tau$ are the maximum element lengths and time steps, respectively, and the positive constant $\gamma$ is independent of h and $\tau$. However, error estimates forhigher order $\mathbb{P}^k(k\geq 2)$ elements need a more restrictive time step $\tau\leq \gamma h^{4/3}$. We remark that this stronger condition is indeed necessary, as the method is linearly unstable under the usual CFL condition $\tau\leq\gamma h$ for the $\mathbb{P}^k$ elements of degree $k\geq 2$. Error estimates of $O(h^{k+1/2}+\tau^2)$ are obtained for general monotone numerical fluxes, and optimal error estimates of $O(h^{k+1}+\tau^2)$ are obtained for upwind numerical fluxes.