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UNESCO-IHE

INTERNATIONAL MASTERS PROGRAMME IN WATER SCIENCE &


ENGINEERING

Introduction to Coastal Engineering 2010 - 2011

Exercise: Siltation 1

Rotterdam Harbour is known as a safe harbour. One of the conditions to maintain this safety is an
ensured minimum water depth all over the year. Periodically dredging is necessary for that.
A particular part of the port of Rotterdam is equipped to receive large tankers. Coming from the
North Sea this part is reached by the south side of the entrance channel (Maasmond, see Fig. 1, 1a-c).

Figure 1: Outline of Maasmond

The super tankers are handled in the Europahaven (haven means harbour) and the Mississippihaven at
the very beginning of the entrance channel which are reached by the Beerkanaal (kanaal means canal).
The remaining tankers are handled in the different basins at the Calandkanaal, i.e. the Beneluxhaven, the
4th, the 5th and the 7th Petroleumhaven and at the end the Brittaniehaven.
Fig. 1a and 1b, Detailed maps of the harbour of Rotterdam.
Fig. 1c, Detailed maps of the harbour of Rotterdam.

This part of the port of Rotterdam can be schematized as an inlet since it is closed at the end. The
lengths, widths and depths of the different parts of the inlet are as follows:

length (m) width (m) depth (m)


A-B 1200 700 i
B-C 3600 700 i
B-D 2600 700 i
D-P X1 500 i
P-R 3900 X2 12.00

where the depths are given at mean sea level.


The depth i corresponds to your student name:

The Europahaven has an area of 3.20 km2, the Mississippihaven of 1.10 km2, the Beneluxhaven of 0.70
km2, while the different petrol basins along the Calandkanaal can be schematized by 4 equal basins with
a length of 1000 m and a width of 500 m. The vertical tide at the mouth of the Calandkanaal (point A on
the map in Fig. 1) is given in Fig. 2; it is assumed that there are 706 of such-like tidal periods per year.
140

120

100

80

60
Tide [cm]

40

20

-20

-40

-60
0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80
Time [10 minutes]

Fig. 2: Tide level at Point A

Data of Fig. 2 in steps of 10 minutes:

0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17
-55 -55 -55 -55 -55 -54 -53 -52 -51 -49 -46 -43 -40 -36 -31 -25 -18 -10

18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35
-2 8 18 29 40 51 62 73 83 93 101 109 115 119 122 124 124 123

36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50 51 52 53
121 118 115 111 108 104 100 97 92 88 83 78 71 65 58 50 42 34

54 55 56 57 58 59 60 61 62 63 64 65 66 67 68 69 70 71
26 18 10 3 -4 -11 -17 -22 -26 -30 -32 -34 -36 -37 -37 -37 -38 -38

72 73 74 75 76 77 78 79 80
-38 -39 -39 -40 -41 -42 -43 -44 -45

The silt content in the water seaward of Point A is about 50 mg/l. When the current velocity in the
Calandkanaal landward of Point A reaches a value less than 0.14 m/s, the silt concentration drops to 20
mg/l within one hour and remains on that level. The salinity of the water is 25‰. The water temperature
may be assumed to be constant at 11ºC.

Questions:

1. What is the density of the water? Measure X1 and X2 from the maps in Fig 1a-c.

2. What is the time difference between low waters in Point C and Point R?

3. How much maintenance dredging (expressed in m3 per year) has to be done in this part of Rotterdam
Harbour, assuming a void percentage (by volume) of the deposited material of 70%?

4. Where has the maintenance dredging to be done? Explain your answer with a calculation.

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