Joint probability distribution of winds and waves from wave simulation of 20 years (1989-2008) in Bohai Bay

Abstract

The joint probability distribution of wind speed and significant wave height in the Bohai Bay was investigated by comparing the Gumbel logistic model, the Gumbel-Hougaard (GH) copula function, and the Clayton copula function. Twenty years of wind data from 1989 to 2008 were collected from the European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts (ECMWF) database and the blended wind data of the Quick Scatterometer (QSCAT) satellite data set and re-analysis data from the United States National Centers for Environmental Prediction (NCEP). Several typhoons were taken into account and merged with the background wind fields from the ECMWF or QSCAT/NCEP database. The 20-year data of significant wave height were calculated with the unstructured-grid version of the third-generation wind wave model Simulating WAves Nearshore (SWAN) under extreme wind process conditions. The Gumbel distribution was used for univariate and marginal distributions. The distribution parameters were estimated with the method of L-moments. Based on the marginal distributions, the joint probability distributions, the associated return periods, and the conditional probability distributions were obtained. The GH copula function was found to be optimal according to the ordinary least squares (OLS) test. The results show that wind waves are the prevailing type of wave in the Bohai Bay.