REAL-TIME MONITORING OF HYDRODYNAMICS AND SUSPENDED SEDIMENT CONCENTRATIONS IN A COASTAL REEF

Abstract

The algal reef ecosystem in Taoyuan coast, Taiwan, is considered a unique endemic species population, but the coastal constructions might cause the sensitive ecological area problems (Kuo et al., 2020). Several studies have confirmed that suspended sediment concentration (c) is a major detrimental factor affecting reef health. In recent years, there has been a focus on long-term monitoring of the c, but without continuous data. Most of study used an optical backscatter sensor (OBS) for long-term monitoring of the c because of its small size, low power, highly linear response and insensitivity to bubbles or organic matter. By contrast, few studies focus on testing how frequency the OBS should be calibrated because of other factor such as sediment size also affect the sensor response. Furthermore, although the long-term monitoring was demonstrated over the years ago, little attention has been paid to the real-time monitoring of c, especially since this method is achieved in the sensitive algal reef. For this reason, the real-time and long-term monitoring of waves and c (started in 2019 and lasts for 7 years) are necessarily performed in this algal reef conservation.