FlexSemFlexSemAarhus University department of Ecoscience

Danish Wadden Sea

Water movement is simulated with a 3D hydrodynamic model using an unstructured computational mesh. The horizontal resolution is highest (~250m) in the tidal channels Grådyb, Knudedyb, Juvre dyb og Liser dyb and lower (~2.8km) on the open boundary towards the North Sea. The model utilizes wet/dry so that areas can dry out during low tide. In the vertical the discretization is Z-layer with a thickness of 0.5 m in the top 4 layers, followed by 3 layers of 1 m, 3 layers of 2 m and 3 layers of 5 m toward the bottom. On the open boundary the model is forced with temperature, salinity, water velocities and water level interpolated from Copernicus model data (https://resources.marine.copernicus.eu/product-detail/NORTHWESTSHELF_ANALYSIS_FORECAST_PHY_004_013). On the surface, the model is forced by wind and temperature modelled with an surface heat model. The heat model uses atmospheric forcings (wind, temperature, dew point temperature and cloud cover), interpolated from the atmospheric WRF model run by Department of Environmental Science, Aarhus University. Fresh water flux from the Danish QNP model is added in 7 point sources kilder (Varde å, Sneum å, Kongeå, Ribe å, Rejsby å, Brøns å, Ballum å og Vidå). The timestep in the model is 2 minutes and the years 2019, 2020 and 2021 were run in separate simulations. The model results has been validated with water level measurements provided by the DMI fridata service and with temperature and salinity profile data from the National Danish Monitoring database ODA.
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