Abstract
Abstract. A coastal forecasting system was implemented to provide wind wave forecasts over the whole Mediterranean Sea area, and with the added capability to focus on selected coastal areas. The goal of the system was to achieve a representation of the small-scale coastal processes influencing the propagation of waves towards the coasts. The system was based on a chain of nested wave models and adopted the WAve Model (WAM) to analyse the large-scale, deep-sea propagation of waves; and the Simulating WAves Nearshore (SWAN) to simulate waves in key coastal areas. Regional intermediate-scale WAM grids were introduced to bridge the gap between the large-scale and each coastal area. Even applying two consecutive nestings (Mediterranean grid → regional grid → coastal grid), a very high resolution was still required for the large scale WAM implementation in order to get a final resolution of about 400 m on the shores. In this study three regional areas in the Tyrrhenian Sea were selected, with a single coastal area embedded in each of them. The number of regional and coastal grids in the system could easily be modified without significantly affecting the efficiency of the system. The coastal system was tested in three Italian coastal regions in order to optimize the numerical parameters and to check the results in orographically complex zones for which wave records were available. Fifteen storm events in the period 2004–2009 were considered.
Highlights
The nature of the generation of wind waves and their propagation in time and space has been thoroughly investigated over recent decades
The use of the kinetic equation to describe the evolution of the wave spectrum (Komen et al, 1984) paved the way for the development of modern numerical methods for simulating the dynamics of wind waves
A full discussion of the subject would be totally beyond the scope of the present work, but thorough accounts of the state of the art and the prospects for improvement of wave models can be found in Holthuijsen (2007), the WISE Group (2007) and Komen et al (1994)
Summary
Corsini1,* 1ISPRA, Istituto Superiore per la Protezione e la Ricerca Ambientale, Roma, Italy 2Consorzio per le Attivitadi Supercalcolo per Universita e Ricerca, Roma, Italy 3Dipartimento di Scienze dell’Ingegneria Civile, Universita Roma Tre, Roma, Italy * at: CIPE, Presidenza del Consiglio, Roma, Italy. Received: 22 April 2011 – Revised: 14 December 2011 – Accepted: 3 January 2012 – Published: 29 February 2012
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