PORT AND COASTAL ENGINEERING

The course aims to introduce students to coastal engineering, providing them with knowledge of both maritime hydraulics and the key elements required for the selection and design of maritime structures, including both coastal and port infrastructures.

Knowledge and Understanding

Students will acquire knowledge of wave mechanics, wave propagation from offshore to the shoreline, the main methods for wave hindcasting and forecasting, coastal sediment transport, and the processes of beach erosion and accretion. Furthermore, students will develop an understanding of the principal criteria for the planning, design, and construction of coastal defense works and port infrastructures. Finally, the impacts of climate change on coastal areas will be discussed, and a range of Nature-based Solutions for protecting coastal zones against flooding and erosion will be presented.

Applying Knowledge and Understanding

Through the development of a group project focused on a maritime hydraulic study and the preliminary design of a coastal defense and/or protection structure, students will acquire the fundamental tools for the statistical and numerical modeling of maritime hydraulic phenomena and coastal dynamics. They will also learn to consider the effects of climate change and the aging of maritime infrastructures, and they will be able to carry out preliminary designs of maritime structures for erosion protection and for the construction and/or adaptation of port facilities.

Making Judgements

By the end of the course, students will be able to:

1. Select the relevant data required for maritime hydraulic studies according to the specific objectives of the analysis;
2. Analyze the causes of flooding and coastal instability phenomena;
3. Critically evaluate alternative solutions for coastal protection and/or the adaptation of port infrastructures, including under climate change scenarios.

Communication Skills

Students will develop both written and oral communication skills. This will be achieved through the preparation of a final written report and through a public presentation and classroom discussion of the results obtained during the group project, attended by the entire class. In addition, the collaborative nature of the group work will foster the development of soft skills such as argumentation, critical discussion, and teamwork.

Learning Skills

Students will be encouraged to develop an independent research and learning approach based on the consultation and study of scientific literature, including the reading and analysis of articles published in leading international journals in the field, national and international technical standards, and technical manuals describing the state of the art in port and coastal engineering. This approach will support their lifelong professional development.

The competencies acquired during the course contribute to the achievement of Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) 6, 7, 9, 11, 13, 14, and 15 of the United Nations 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development.

The course is organized as follows:

-traditional lectures, carried out using a participative approach in order to obatin the maximum involvement of the students;

- practical exercises, carried out in informatic classrooms. Such excercis are supervised  in order to be sure that all the students will learn during the classtime how to apply the most important concepts and methods to be used in the field of maritime hydraulics, coastal and port engineering;

-guided tours of the laboratory of hydraulics of DICAR, to teach students about the experimental methods used for the physical modelling of coastal problems;

-field visits  at building sites of maritime and coastal works and/or at the premises of public or privaty bodies involved in the coastal management (Port Authorities, Technical Offices, PEs, etc.).

Students who, following the presentation of the appropriate documentation (D.R. n. 1598 of 2/5/2018), have obtained recognition of the status of student worker, student athlete, student in difficulty and student with disabilities, will be able to follow a personalized learning path whose methods will be agreed with the teacher.

1. INTRODUCTION
2. HYDROSPHERE– Characterization of the hydrosphere – Mean sea level – Tides and currentsi – Wave generation and monitoring.
3. SOURCES OF DATA – The National Hydrographic and Mareographic Service – Bathymetric maps and Beach Atlas – Sea bottom measurements.
4. REGULAR GRAVITY WAVES – Formulation of the 2D problem – Linear wave theory – Engineering properties of linear waves.
5. WAVE PROPAGATION OVER GENTLE SLOPING BEACH - Wave shoaling – Wave breaking – Wave refraction – Wave diffraction.
6. WAVE REFLECTION – Formulation of the problem – Pressure distrubution and Saintflou approximation – Reflection coefficient – Wave reflection due to absorbing caissons – Wave reflection due to docks over piles.
7. WAVE CLIMATE AND WAVE HINDCASTING – Wind generation – Geostrophic wind – Estimation of the wind velocity on the sea surface – Wind data – Geographic fetch and effective fetch.
8. SEA WAVES – Random waves and sea states – Probability distribution of surface elevation – SMB model – Geographic traslation of wave data - Storm – Analysis of extreme events.
9. COASTAL MORPHOLOGY – Characteristics of coastal sediments – Classification of beaches – Beach profiles – Planar beach shape.
10. SEDIMENT TRANSPORT – Flow field action on the sediment dynamics – Bedforms and additional resistences – Coastal sediment transport.
11. EROSION AND DEPOSITION – Description of coastal sites and physiographic unit – Sediment budget – Erosion due to sea level change – Antropic causes of erosion/deposition – Evolution of the shoreline.
12. COASTAL PROTECTION STRUCTURES – Passive and active structures to control beach erosion – Beach nourishment – Mixed solution – Dune stabilization and requalification.
13. GUIDELINES FOR COASTAL PROTECTION – Required data and analysis – Guidelines for selecting the type of coastal structure.
14. HARBOURS – Types of ports - Regulation - Ship - Overview of harbour structures - Layout - Interaction with sediment transport - Channel and harbour basins- Breakwaters (rubble mound and vertical wall) - Berths- Specialized protection of harbour structures from erosion and corrosio - Marinas - Container terminals - Dredging
15. CLIMATE CHANGE AND COASTAL PROTECTION THROUGH NATURE-BASED-SOLUTIONS

1. R. Dean, R. Darlrymple, Water wave mechanics for engineers and scientists, World Scientific, 1991
2. R. Dean, R. Darlrymple, Coastal Processes with Engineering Applications, Cambridge University Press, 2002
3. U.S. Army, Coastal Engineering Research Center, Coastal Engineering Manual, 2006.
4. Thoresen, C.A. (2014). Port Designer’s Handbook: reccomandation and guidelines. ICE Publishing.
5. Tsinker, G.P. (2004). Port engineering: planning, construction, maintenance, and security. John Wiley and Sons, inc.
6. CIRIA, CUR, CETMEF  (2007). The Rock Manual. The use of rock in hydraulic engineering (2nd edition). C683, CIRIA, London.

Linear wave theory

Dispertion relationship

Wave refraction

Shoaling and breaking

Wave reflection

One-line model of shoreline evolution

Hydraulic and stability design of a rubble mound breakwater 

Beach nourishment

Methods for wave hidcasting

Statistical analysis of extreme events 

Harbour structures

Rubble mound breakwaters

Vertical wall breakwater

Berths