Turbulence and suspended particulate matter dynamics in the Dee estuary.

People: Will Thurston, Alex Souza, Mark Pritchard.

Description: Estuaries are the pathway between freshwater systems and the oceans, so as a result the strength of mixing (i.e. turbulence) within them determines the amount of dissolved nutrients, suspended matter and anthropegenic pollution that reaches the sea.

An understanding of the physical processes controlling turbulence and SPM dynamics are now more important than ever, due to the growing interest in using prognostic numerical models as water quality and ecosystem management forecasting tools.

For example, the POLCOMS shelf-seas model, developed by Proudman Oceanographic Laboratory (POL), has been run operationally by the Met Office since 2000.

Its domain covers the north-west European continental shelf and much of the shelf break to the west of the British Isles, with resolution of 1/9° latitude and 1/6° longitude (~12 km).
Nested within this model it is possible to run an estuary-scale model at approximately 200 m resolution.

It is the aim of this project to improve this estuary scale model, applied to the Dee, for nesting into POLCOMS.

The improvements will be made by testing and developing turbulence closure and SPM dynamics schemes specifically applied to the Dee, and then validating the model with data collected during the project.

Funded by: NERC CASE studentship with Proudman Oceanographic Laboratory, Liverpool

Start date: Oct 2005
End date: Oct 2008

Links: http://www.pol.ac.uk/