Spatiotemporal shoreline change in Boushehr Province coasts, Iran

Abstract

Since coastal areas have highly dynamic nature and are one of the most beneficial regions of civilizations, it is of great significance to understand their characteristics and behavior. Changes in shorelines in the form of accretion and erosion can leave devastating effects on businesses and cities located along the shore. In this study, we statistically calculated the tendency of shoreline changes by processing and analyzing historical satellite images of Boushehr Province, Iran. Results show that these shores have experienced both sedimentation and erosion in the past 30 years. Net shoreline movement presents more than 350 m of erosion and 650 m of accretion, which are corresponded to change rates of almost 12 and 22 m/a, respectively. Statistics of shoreline changes are calculated from regression methods including end point rate, linear regression rate, weighted linear regression, and least median of squares. The best-performed method is applied to predict the shoreline position in 2050 and 2100. Potential locations of excessive changes are identified for the predicted shorelines, which should be dealt with properly.