Water Research Laboratory, School of Civil and Environmental Engineering, UNSW Sydney, Sydney, NSW, Australia.
PLoS One. 2021 Sep 20;16(9):e0257538. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0257538. eCollection 2021.
How an estuary responds to sea level rise (SLR) is complex and depends on energy drivers (e.g., tides and river inflows), estuarine geometry (e.g., length and depth), intrinsic fluid properties (e.g., density), and bed/bank roughness. While changes to the tidal range under SLR can impact estuarine sediment transport, water quality, and vegetation communities, studies on the altered tidal range under SLR are often based on case studies with outcomes applicable to a specific site. As such, this study produced a large ensemble of estuarine hydrodynamic models (>1800) to provide a systematic understanding of how tidal range dynamics within different estuary types may change under various SLR and river inflow scenarios. The results indicated that SLR often amplifies the tidal range of different estuary types, except for short estuaries with a low tidal range at the mouth where SLR attenuates the tides. SLR alters the location of the points with minimum tidal range and overall tidal range patterns in an estuary. Variations in tidal range were more evident in converging estuaries, shallower systems, or in estuaries with strong river inflows. These findings provide an indication of how different estuary types may respond to estuaries and may assist estuarine managers and decision makers.
河口对海平面上升 (SLR) 的响应非常复杂，取决于能量驱动因素（如潮汐和河流流入）、河口几何形状（如长度和深度）、固有流体特性（如密度）和床/岸粗糙度。虽然海平面上升下的潮差变化会影响河口泥沙输运、水质和植被群落，但海平面上升下的潮差变化研究通常基于案例研究，其结果适用于特定地点。因此，本研究生成了大量的河口水动力模型（>1800 个），以系统地了解不同类型河口的潮汐范围动态在各种海平面上升和河流流入情景下可能如何变化。结果表明，海平面上升通常会放大不同类型河口的潮差，除了河口较短且口门处潮差较小的情况，在这种情况下，海平面上升会减弱潮汐。海平面上升改变了河口内最小潮差点和整体潮差模式的位置。在汇流河口、较浅的系统或河流流入较强的河口，潮差的变化更为明显。这些发现表明了不同类型的河口可能对海平面上升的响应方式，并可能为河口管理者和决策者提供帮助。
