Spectral Wave Modeling in Very Shallow Water at Southern Coast of Caspian Sea

Abstract

This study evaluates the capability of the Simulating WAves Nearshore (SWAN) wave model (version 41.01) in predicting significant wave height and spectral peak energy content for swell waves in very shallow water of surf zone during depth-induced wave breaking and dissipation. The model results were compared with field measurements at five nearshore stations. The results demonstrated that some breaker index formulations were successful for significant wave height prediction in surf zones. However, an incorrect shape of the energy spectrum and overestimated near spectral peak energy content at shallow water stations were obtained using all of the embedded depth-induced wave breaking formulations in SWAN. The dependent breaker index on relative depth (Kpd) formulation, which was successful in predicting near spectral peak energy content, resulted in an average error of 30%. Finally, this formulation was modified to enhance the model performance in reproducing the spectral peak energy content.