Tides, sea-level rise and tidal power extraction on the European shelf

Abstract

An established numerical tidal model has been used to investigate the impact of various sea-level rise (SLR) scenarios, as well as SLR in combination with large-scale tidal power plants on European shelf tidal dynamics. Even moderate and realistic levels of future SLR are shown to have significant impacts on the tidal dynamics of the area. These changes are further enhanced when SLR and tidal power plants are considered in combination, resulting in changes to tidal amplitudes, currents and associated tidal dissipation and bed shear stresses. Sea-level rise is the dominant influence on any far-field impacts, whereas tidal power plants are shown to have the prevailing influence over any changes close to the point of energy extraction. The spatial extent of the impacts of energy extraction is shown to be affected by the sea level when more than one tidal power plant in the Irish Sea was considered. Different ways to implement SLR in the model are also discussed and shown to be of great significance for the response of the tides.