Author(s): Francisco Taveira Pinto; Raquel Silva; Rui China Pereira
Linked Author(s): Francisco Taveira Pinto
Keywords: No Keywords
Abstract: The Portuguese coastline is often submitted to high energy levels, resulting from the action of the sea, so its protection assumes, presently and in some places, an urgency character. An efficient management of the coastal zone should be based on a thorough knowledge of reality, particularly of the wave-structure interaction. It is necessary to consider all possible solutions, highlighting their benefits and trying to minimize their negative effects. A series of studies, which have been carried out on the Hydraulics, Water Resources and Environment Division (SHRHA), of the Civil Engineering Department (DEC), of Faculty of Engineering, University of Porto (FEUP), aim to evaluate the efficiency of detached breakwaters as coastal defence structures of the west coast of Portugal. Firstly, a detached breakwater was proposed for the defence of the urban front of Espinho, located on the northwest coast of Portugal. Following this study, numerical simulation of the hydrodynamic and the morphodynamic conditions were performed, using the SMC (Sistema de Modelado Costero) software, developed in Cantabria University to support coastal zones management. The present situation was compared with a scenario of implantation of the proposed breakwater. Simulation results suggested the need to test different configurations for the detached breakwater. Afterwards, a physical modelling research study was conducted in order to analyze the effect of different configurations of coastline parallel detached structures in the adjacent coastline/beach. Moreover, the configuration optimization was sought in order to reduce negative effects, for typical conditions of the northwest coast of Portugal. In this article, important aspects of these studies are presented and discussed.
Year: 2012