Simulation of arrested salt wedges with a multi-layer Shallow Water Lattice Boltzmann model

Abstract

The ability to accurately and efficiently model the intrusion of salt wedges into river beds is crucial to assay its interaction with human activities and the natural environment. We present a 2D multi-layer Shallow Water Lattice Boltzmann (SWLB) model able to predict the salt wedge intrusion in river estuaries. The formulation usually employed for the simulation of gravity currents is here equipped with proper boundary conditions to handle both the downstream seaside outlet and the upstream river inlet. Firstly, the model is validated against highly accurate semi-analytical solutions of the steady state 1D two-layer Shallow Water model. Secondly, the model is applied to a more complex, fully 3D geometry, to assess its capability to handle realistic cases. The simple formulation proposed for the shear interlayer stress is proven to be consistent with the general 3D viscous solution. In addition to the accuracy, the model inherits the efficiency of the Lattice Boltzmann approach to fluid dynamics problems.