Interactive modeling of storm impact

Abstract:

In the past decades the impact of storms on the coastal zone has increasingly drawn the attention of policy makers and coastal planners, engineers and researchers. The mean reason for this interest is the high density of the world’s population living near the ocean, in combination with climate change. Due to sea level rise and extremer weather conditions, many of the world’s coastlines are becoming more vulnerable to the potential of flooding.

Currently it is common practice to predict storm impact using physics-based numerical models. The numerical model utilizes several inputs (e.g. bathymetry, waves, surge) to calculate the impact on the coastline. Traditionally, the numerical modeller takes the following three steps: schematization/model setup, running and post-processing. This process generally has a total feedback time in the order of hours to days, and is suitable for so-called confirmatory modelling.However, often models are applied as an exploratory tool, in which the effect of e.g. different hydraulic conditions, or measures is investigated. The above described traditional work flow is not the most efficient method for exploratory modelling.

Interactive modelling lets users adjust a simulation while running. For models typically used for storm impact studies (e.g. XBeach, Delft3D, D-Flow FM), the user can for instance change the storm surge level, wave conditions, or add a measure such as a nourishment or a seawall. The model will take the adjustments into account immediately, and will directly compute the effect. Using this method, tools can be developed in which stakeholders (e.g. coastal planners, policy makers) are in control and together evaluate ideas by interacting with the model. Here we will show initial results for interactive modelling with a storm impact model.