EFFECTS OF WAVE FIELD CHANGES DUE TO RECLAMATIONS ON FLOW AND WATER QUALITY IN AN ENCLOSED SEA

Abstract

 Coastal development has been underway with one of the objectives to prevent disasters and has resulted in changes to the wave field. Also, the changes may have affected oceanic flows since there are many effects of wind-waves on the flows, such as wind-wave-driven vertical mixing at the sea surface. In this study, numerical simulations have been conducted using an ocean-wave-water quality coupled model where the interactions between wind-waves and flows are taken into account. The calculation results showed that wave heights in the coastal area were decreased due to reclamations and harbor tranquility was improved. In addition, the decrease in wave heights weakened the vertical mixing of water through a decrease in turbulent kinetic energy and turbulent length scale at the sea surface. This effect due to wave field changes was not represented in the calculation without wave model coupling. Furthermore, the weakening of wave-induced vertical mixing in the coastal area prompted hypoxia.