Building safety with nature: Salt marshes for flood risk reduction

Flood risk reduction in coastal areas is traditionally approached from a conventional engineering perspective, where dikes and dams are built to withstand the forces of tides, surges and waves. Recently, a nature-based approach to flood risk reduction is increasingly promoted, in which the benefits of coastal ecosystems for reducing the impact...

Salt marsh modelling: implemented on a GPU

In this thesis, a coupled hydrodynamic, morphodynamic and plant growth model is reviewed. The goal of this model is to simulate plant colonization and channel formation on an initially flat or ascending substrate in a tidal landscape. To be able to simulate these biophysical processes on a small enough scale (while still using the same spatial...

Wave attenuation by salt marsh vegetation

Salt marshes are a characteristic feature of estuaries and coastal seas. They are found in the upper coastal intertidal zones between land and water, which are regularly flooded by tides and surges. They are covered with salt-tolerant vegetation types, such as herbs and grasses. Sheltering from continuous intense hydrodynamic forcing by waves...

Sea Wave Attenuation by Salt Marsh Vegetation

The main topic of this dissertation is concerned with potential sea wave attenuation by salt marsh vegetation. The overall structure of the dissertation is divided into a literature review and an experimental paper, which is further divided into an in-situ and ex-situ study. Salt marshes have some protected status within the EU and much study is...