GLOBAL SEA LEVEL RISE AND THE CONSEQUENCES FOR THE BUILT

ENVIRONMENT

5 JUNE 2008

P R O F E S S O R S M A R T I N F I S C H E R A N D B E N S C H W E G L E R

N A T H A N C H A S E , V I V I E N C H U A , D A V I D N E W E L L

Dammed if You Do,Damned if You Don’t

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Inundated areas resulting from 2m SLR

http://flood.firetree.net/

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Introduction

How we got here…

“With a little research and advice from the

professors, putting together a basic dike

design was fairly straightforward… after that,

I was hooked! Countless hours later, the

design process continues…” – Nathan Chase

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4

Some striking results…

David Newell

Gravel shortages

50+ years for China

65+ years for India

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Some striking results…

Vivien Chua

The first step in reliable engineering design is modeling -we are closer to creating a better world!

Background and Need6

Coastal Development & Ports

Over half of world’s population lives within 200km of the coast (UN, 2001)1

35% coastal pop. growth projected between 1995-2025 (Columbia U.)2

7.187 billion metric tons of seaborne trade in 2006 (AAPA)3

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Sea Level Rise – Fact or Fiction?

Model does not include “future dynamical changes in ice flow”

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Hurricane Katrina Hurricane Andrew

Natural Disasters9

Cyclone Nargis10

Project Overview11

Project Overview

Analyze coastal protection design alternatives

Quantify current/projected capacity of design & construction industry

Model the response using 2D/3D/4D tools and disseminate information

Compare capacity to what is needed

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Limited understanding of DCI capacity

No official statistics for US

Natural disasters can cause significant impact (e.g., Hurricane Katrina/Rita)

Difficulty in compiling global data

Resources are allocated on a regional or national basis e.g. cranes, dredges, steel

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How to Protect Ports

Define the protection strategy and scope

e.g. dikes, levees, landfill for port surface

Develop a “minimum reasonable design” for the scope

Obtain cost data reflective of regional conditions

Compare the design and scope to global data on materials, weather, construction goods and services, etc.

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Why ports?

Fixed infrastructure that cannot be relocated easily

High economic value, easy to measure

Clear baseline of what will be protected

Data availability

Simplifying assumption (difficulties with residential/commercial developments, undeveloped areas, etc.)

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Port Selection16

177 Ports

6 Continents

Population (> 1

million)

Tonnage or

Containers (TEUs)

1 Twenty-foot Equivalent Unit (TEU) is one 20-ft container

(one 40-ft container = 2 TEUs)

Methodology for Case Studies

Goal: evaluate and strengthen project by performing detailed case studies in different regions

Overall procedure:

Site identification

Conceptual design alternatives evaluation

Schematic design development

Incorporation of results in overall project

Tools have been developed to simplify the data collection and design element

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Current Status18

Current Status

Port Characteristics

World’s most important 177 ports, integrated into Google Earth

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Current Status

GIS model “automatically” determines:

- Protection length

- Average protectionheight

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Current Status

Cost and availability/capacity data (US, Asia, Europe) RS Means

UN

Countrywatch

Etc.

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Current Status

Coastal Protection Design tool

Offshore dike, navigation lock, pump station, maintenance dredging

Dike

Lock

Pump

PortOpen OceanDredge

River flooding

Silt

Wave overtopping, scour

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Long Beach Harbor a Case Study

“Manual” design10.5 miles long25m high

- Cost: $1693 million

-Time to construct:21.1 years

“Model” design10 miles long9m high

- Cost: $712 million

- Time to construct:9.7 years

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1 meter sea level rise predicted by 2100!!!25

Sea level record at Golden Gate

Areas at risk in San Francisco Bay

• GIS modeling

• 2D hydrodynamic modeling

1 meter sea level rise

http://flood.firetree.net

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Sacramento-San Joaquin delta

Golden Gate channel

Calibration at NOAA station

Golden Gate (9414290)

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0 2 4 6 8 10 12

x 105

-1

-0.5

0

0.5

1

1.5

2

2.5

Tides at Golden Gate

0 2 4 6 8 10 12 14

x 105

-2

-1.5

-1

-0.5

0

0.5

1

1.5

Tides at Golden Gate

Model

Observations

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What if we do nothing?

• 2D hydrodynamic modeling

Flooding risks

Changes to circulation

patterns

Deterioration of water

quality

Disappearing

habitats/ecosystems

Modifications to sediment

distributions

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Erosion of salt ponds & submerging tidal marshes

Average depth of tidal

marshes and salt ponds =

0.1 m

1 m sea level rise

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Action plan: Partial intrusion

barrage at Golden Gate

Regulate amount of

sea water entering

and leaving the bay

Sea water entering bay as flood tide

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A tidal power barrage?

Estimate of tidal power at Golden Gate

QghP where ρ = density of sea water = 1000 kg/m3, Q = flow rate, g = acceleration due to gravity = 9.81 m2/s, h = tidal amplitude

In a neap-spring cycle,

Max Q = 5000 m3/s

Max h = 2 m

Max P = 1x108W

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Results

-90

-70

-50

-30

-10

10

30

50

70

90

-180 -150 -120 -90 -60 -30 0 30 60 90 120 150

Ports - Overview by Location (LatLon)

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Measuring our Results35

Time to Construct

• Unconstrained (No limitations on materials or resources)

• Constrained by materials

• Constrained by resources (capacity)

• 4D Model Results

Materials

• Raw amountof material required

• Relative amount compared to current production capacity

Cost

• Cost per Shipping Unit• Tonnage• TEUs• Bbl Oil

(Middle East)

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0

2

4

6

8

10

12

14

16

18

Nu

mb

er

of

Po

rts

Distribution of Construction Duration by Region

0-2 years

2-5 years

5-10 years

10-20 years

20-50 years

50+ years

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0 20 40 60 80 100 120 140

Australia-New Zealand

Black Sea

Caribbean

China-Korea

SE Asia

India

Japan

Middle East

E Africa

W Africa

Alaska-Hawaii

N America

S America

Mediterranean

N Europe

Years

Time to Construct Defenses by Region

Unconstrained

Capacity Constrained

Material Constrained

Model Constrained

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6%

13%

25%

50%

100%

200%

400%

800%

1600%

3200%

6400%

12800%

Percentage of Current Supply Requiredto Construct Defenses by Region

Cement

Gravel

Sand

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0

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9

Me

tric

To

ns

o

f M

ate

ria

l

Mil

lio

ns

Total Material Demand by Region

Total Cement

Total Gravel

Total Sand

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0

5000

10000

15000

20000

25000

Le

ng

th i

n M

ete

rs

Average Length of Defense per Port by Region

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0

10

20

30

40

50

60

70

Metric Tons of Material per Meter of Length by Region

Cement/Meter

Gravel/Meter

Sand/Meter

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1

2

4

8

16

32

64

128

256

512

1024

2048

Do

lla

rs

Cost to Construct per Shipping Unit per Year

Cost/TEU Cost/Metric Ton Cost/bbl Crude Oil

Google Earth Demonstration

Netherlands

Stanford/S.F. Bay

San Pedro Bay (L.A.)

Port Characteristics

Port Polygons

4D Model

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Future Directions44

Collaborations, Raising Awareness

New collaborations in Netherlands, India, etc.

Stanford Engineering & Public Policy Framework Project: Climate Change and its Impact on the Built Environment

Write journal articles

Make GoogleEarth project data available

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Fall 2008 Undergrad/Grad Course

3 unit CEE course, but need students in economics, public policy, computer science

Focus: Principles & practices for designing a marine construction project, as applied to the Stanford Engineering Framework project Week 1: Introduction, project background, reading on case studies (Netherlands,

Japan, Hurricane Katrina) Week 2: Marine Construction industry: equipment, materials, labor (guest lecturer

from industry) Week 3: Site selection and characterization (guest lecture on coastal development) Week 4-6: Conceptual design (guest lecture) Week 7-9: Schematic design (guest lecture on hydrologic modeling) Week 10: Writing up and presenting results (in class presentations, final reports)

Other elements: intensive collaboration session with students from Delft, Madras/Chennai

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Acknowledgements

Fred Raichlen, California Institute of Technology

Kyle Johnson, Great Lakes Dredge & Dock

Bob Bittner, Ben C. Gerwick Inc.

Andrew Peterman, Walt Disney Imagineering

Chris Holm, Walt Disney Co.

Austin Becker, Rhode Island Sea Grant

Christian Brockmann, Bremen University of Applied Sciences

Prior Stanford students: Mike Dvorak, LakshmiAlagappan, Evridiki Fekka, Elisa Zhang

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Questions?

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