Indian Journal of Geo-Marine Sciences

Vol. 43 (7), July 2014, pp. 1281-1285

Assessment of shoreline oscillations along south Gujarat coastline, India

N.P.Manek & R. Balaji*
Department of Civil Engineering, IIT Bombay, Mumbai-76, India
*[Email: rbalaji@civil.iitb.ac.in]

Received 16 August 2013; revised 13 November 2013

In the present study, the coastline change analysis of South Gujarat along the west coast of India has been taken up for a
detailed investigation. Historical satellite imageries from Landsat ETM+ are used to estimate the positions of the shoreline
along this stretch of the coast, for various years. A finite-difference based numerical model was also setup for the selected
coastal stretch to estimate the shoreline changes. The coastlines extracted from the first few satellite imageries are used to
calibrate the numerical model, where as the rest are used to validate the numerical model. Based on the numerical model,
attempt is also made to predict the fate of the coastline in the near future. An average erosion rate of about 4 m/year is
estimated along the South Gujarat coastline. It is also observed in the predicted coastlines from 2018 to 2033 the average
erosion ranges from 32.55 m in 2018 to 61.79 m in 2033. The details of the data, numerical model and analysis are presented
in this paper.

[Keywords: Landsat ETM+, ArcGIS, Shoreline, Erosion, Accretion]

Introduction The area chosen for study is South Gujarat

Coasts are one of the most dynamic zones in nature
as it experiences time varying waves and its associated
dynamics that leads to erosion or accretion. Coastlines
show visible variations over years, months or days, due
to the variations in the wave characteristics with time.
Apart from the natural dynamics, man-made activities
also make the coast unstable. The location of shoreline
and changing position of coastal boundary through
time are of elemental importance to coastal scientists,
engineers and managers. The shoreline, which is
defined as the position of the land-water interface at
one instant in time is a highly dynamic feature and is
an indicator for coastal erosion and accretion. The
historic shoreline change indicates a cumulative
outcome of the processes that altered the shoreline for
the periods analyzed, facilitates in formulating
effective coastal management strategies and planning
by revealing trends.
The study aims at estimating the shoreline
evolutions along the South Gujarat coast through
satellite imageries and numerical model. Within this
context, the study also attempt to establish the values
of empirical longshore coefficients for South Gujarat
coastline using historical satellite imageries and
numerical modeling techniques and to predict future
shorelines after successful calibration and validation
through the numerical model.
coastline, along west coast of India, covering three
districts. This part of Gujarat coastline subjected to
constant erosion over the past few decades. The
direction of annual net transport rate along Gujarat is
also varying over space and time1, the reason why the
erosion and the sediment transport characteristics
shows a different pattern.
Materials and Methods
Data collection
Understanding the oscillations of any coastline
requires collection of few fundamental data; history of
positions of the coast for assessment, seabed contours
of the region/bathymetry, wave and sediment
characteristics of the near shore region.
For the numerical model study, the bathymetry of
part of western coast of India (Fig. 1) is extracted
from various admiralty charts.
Fig. 1—Bathymetry (WGS84, UTM-Zone 43) and study area
(marked)
1282 INDIAN J MAR SCI VOL 43 NO 7, JULY 2014

The offshore wave data for the numerical model is by Coastal and Hydraulics Laboratory, US Army
extracted from European Centre for Medium range Corps of Engineers. The equation governing
Weather Forecasting (ECMWF) portal, in the form of shoreline change is formulated by conservation of
time histories for various years. sand volume. Consider a right-handed
Historical shoreline positions are used to establish Cartesian coordinate system in which the y-axis
the long shore coefficients for which satellite points offshore and the x-axis oriented parallel to
imageries are used. The images used for this study the trend of the coast. The model assumes that the
are extracted from the web portal of USGS beach profile translates seaward or shoreward along
(http://earthexplorer.usgs.gov/). Different images in a section of coast without changing shape when a net
ETM and ETM+ were used for the study starting from amount of sand enters or leaves the section
the year 1998 to 2013 covering a span of 15 years. during a time interval Δt. The change in shoreline
For the present study ETM and ETM+ data are position is Δy, the length of the shoreline segment is
used, as presented in Table 1. The satellite imageries Δx, and the profile moves within a vertical extent
are then processed to get photographic stretches of defined by the berm elevation DB and the closure
coastline. The images were transformed by combining depth DC, both measured from the vertical datum
the bands 5(Red) 4(Blue) and 2(Green) on RGB (MSL), as indicated in Fig. 3. The change in
respectively, so as to identify the coast. The shoreline volume of the section and is determined by the net
positions of these satellite imageries are then amount of sand that entered or exited the section from
delineated using standard geospatial processing tools, its four sides. The contribution to the volume
as shown in Fig. 2. A total of about 180 transects with change results if there is a difference ΔQ in the long
an interval of 400 m are constructed along the shore sand transport rate Q.
coastline to assess the erosion/accretion rate of each The governing equation for the rate of change of
year from the satellite imageries. Coastal features, shoreline position is given as;
such as river inlets, wetlands and creeks are not
considered for the present study.
Numerical modeling of shoreline evolution
Description of numerical model
The evolution of the shoreline are estimated
through a finite-difference based numerical scheme,
NEMOS package, which contains wave
transformation module (STWAVE2) as well as
shoreline prediction module (GENESIS3), developed Fig. 2—Typical shoreline delineation using geospatial processing
tool
Table 1—Detailed description of satellite data
Date of Pixel Level of
Data Path/Row Bands
Acq size Processing
Land sat ETM 148/46 Mar 7 30 m L1T
5,1998
Land sat ETM+ 148/46 Apr 8 30 m L1T
13,2001
Land sat ETM+ 148/46 Mar 5, 8 30 m L1T
2003
Land sat ETM+ 148/46 Feb22, 8 30 m L1T
2005
Land sat ETM+ 148/46 Dec 13, 8 30 m L1T
2007
Land sat ETM+ 148/46 May 8, 8 30 m L1T
2009
Land sat ETM+ 148/46 Jan 6, 8 30 m L1T
2011
Land sat ETM+ 148/46 Feb 28, 8 30 m L1T
2013 Fig. 3—Definition sketch of shoreline calculation
 MANEK & BALAJI: ASSESSMENT OF SHORELINE OSCILLATIONS ALONG SOUTH GUJARAT COASTLINE 1283

y 1  Q  section. The value of K2 is typically 0.5 to 1.0 times

  q  0 … (1)
  D B  DC   x  that of K1. It is not recommended to vary K2 much
beyond l.0 K1, as exaggerated shoreline change may
The empirical predictive formula for the longshore be calculated in the vicinity of structures and
sand transport rate used in the model is given as; numerical instability may occur. In summary, because
 2   H 
of the many assumptions and approximations that
Q =  H C g   a 1 sin 2bs  a2 cos bs  … (2) have gone into formulation of the shoreline response
 b  x  b
model, and to account for the actual sand transport
where; H = wave height, Cg = wave group speed along a given coast, the coefficients K1 and K2 are
given by linear wave theory, b = subscript denoting treated as calibration parameters in the model. Their
wave breaking condition and θbs= angle of breaking values are determined by reproducing measured
waves to the local shoreline. shoreline change and order of magnitude and
The non dimensional parameters a1 and a2 are given direction of the long shore sand transport rate.
by; The NEMOS numerical model has both wave
transformation module and the shoreline change
a1 
K2
7 /1
… (3) module, inbuilt. The schematic flow chart of various
 ps  processes that considered in the model is depicted
16   1 1  p 1.416 
 p  in Fig. 4. The wave transformation model is a steady-
state; phase-averaged spectral wave model based on
K2
a2  7/2
… (4) the wave action balance equation and is capable of
 ps  simulating depth-induced wave refraction and
8  1 1  p 1.416 
 p  shoaling.
For the present study, the shoreline model domain
where; K1 and K2 = empirical coefficients treated was coupled within the coverage of wave
as calibration parameters, ps= density of sand, transformation model domain. The wave model
ρ = density of water, p = porosity of sand on bed domain was extended beyond the limits of the
and tanβ = avg bottom slope from the shoreline to shoreline domain so that an adequate wave energy
the depth of active longshore sand transport. field could be generated by the wave model and
The first term in Eqn. 2 corresponds to the “CERC passed to the shoreline model. A shoreline stretch of
formula” described in the SPM (CERC)4 and accounts about more than 70 kms along the south Gujarat
for longshore sand transport produced by obliquely coastline is considered in the present study. The area
incident breaking waves. A value of K1=0.77 was is then discretised into rectangular cells of uniform
originally determined by5 from their sand tracer size of about 400 m. A two stage wave transformation
experiments, using rms wave height in the is required for the present study as the nearshore wave
calculations. However, later, Kraus et al.6 characteristics are not available. Initially, the offshore
recommended a decrease from 0.77 to 0.58 on the wave date is transformed to relatively shallow water
basis of their tracer experiments. The second term in depths of about 30 m, from where another
eqn. 2 is not part of the CERC formula and is used to transformation model with finer grids is setup to
describe the effect of another generating mechanism
for longshore sand transport, the longshore gradient in
breaking wave height. This contribution to the long
shore transport rate was introduced into shoreline
change modeling by7.
Although the values of K1 and K2 have been
empirically estimated, these coefficients are treated as
parameters in calibration of the model and will be
called “transport parameters” hereafter. The transport
parameter K1 controls the timescale of the simulated
shoreline change, as well as the magnitude of the
long shore sand transport rate. This control of the
time scale and magnitude of the long shore sand
transport rate is performed in concert with the factor
l/(DB + DC) appearing in eqn. 1, as discussed in a later Fig. 4—Schematic flow chart of the model
1284 INDIAN J MAR SCI VOL 43 NO 7, JULY 2014
Fig. 5—Typical histograms of wave characteristics (sample wave
data 1998-2001).
Fig. 6—Typical Beach erosion/accretion comparison from year
1998 - 2013
transform the waves to nearshore. Typical histogram
of percent occurrence of the wave parameters before
transformation is represented on Fig. 5.
Results and Discussion
Using the satellite imagery based information, the
selected shoreline has been delineated from and the rate
of change were calculated for the period between
1998 and 2013 and the results show that there have
been significant changes along the entire coast for the
15 years period under study. An overall range of
erosion rate of about 4 to 12 m/year is observed for
the study area. The typical erosion/accretion observed
along transects constructed in the study area are
shown in Fig. 6.
Calibration and validation of numerical model
Using the delineated shoreline positions obtained
from satellite imageries of few years (1998-2005), the
transport coefficients (K1 and K2) adopted in the
numerical model are estimated. The effective grain
size, the average berm height and depth of closure are
taken as 0.8 mm, 3 m and 6 m, respectively, based on
field survey and available data. Based on the
calibration it is estimated that an optimal value of
K1 = 0.091 and K2= 0.05 appears to give good results
and are used for future validation of numerical model.
Fig. 7—Typical comparison of coastlines extracted from satellite
imagery and numerical model (year 2001)
Fig. 8—Typical comparison of erosion/accretion obtained from
satellite imagery and numerical model (year 2001)
The shoreline positions were then predicted using
the established transport coefficients through
the numerical model, which is in good agreement
with satellite based shoreline positions, as typical
shown in Fig. 7 and Fig. 8.
Prediction for Future
After arriving at suitable values of K1 and K2 the
shoreline model is used for future prediction of the
shoreline positions. For the future prediction of
shoreline a theoretical wave data is assumed which is
the long term mean of 15 years wave data. Any
extreme events like storms are not included in the
prediction. The shoreline prediction for the years
2018, 2023, 2028, and 2033 with respect 2013
coastline are carried out using the numerical model.
Table 2 shows the maximum and average values
of erosion along the selected coastline for future. It
is observed that the average erosion ranges from
32.55 m in 2018 to 61.79 m in 2033. This indicates
 MANEK & BALAJI: ASSESSMENT OF SHORELINE OSCILLATIONS ALONG SOUTH GUJARAT COASTLINE
Table 2—Erosion/accretion with respect to 2013 coastline
Erosion (m)
Year
Maximum Average
2018 209.96 32.55
2023 306.84 48.30
2028 366.14 55.80
2033 398.60 61.79
that the coastline may be experiencing high rates of
erosion in future at an average of erosion of about
4 m/year.
Conclusions
In this study, the oscillations of South Gujarat
coastline are studied. The historical coastline
positions were extracted using satellite imagery over a
span of 15 years from 1998 to 2013. The
accretion/erosion rates are estimated using
perpendicular transects from a datum point. It is
observed that the South Gujarat coastline is
experiencing high rates of erosion and estimated to be
predominant along Valsad district. The historic
coastline positions are then used to estimate the
longshore coefficients, which in turn used to calibrate
the numerical model. The calibrated longshore
coefficients are validated by comparing the shoreline
predictions from the numerical model with that of
extracted from the satellite imageries. Based on the
study, the following conclusions are arrived.
 With respect to the satellite imagery based
analysis, the coastal erosion rate of about 4m/year
is observed along the south Gujarat coastline. It is
1285
also found that though there are patches of
sediment accretions; however, majority of the
selected coastline is experiencing continuous
erosion.
 Using the satellite imagery based coastlines, the
longshore coefficients are estimated to be
K1=0.09 and K2=0.05 for the south Gujarat
coastline.
 The shoreline positions predicted from the
numerical model is in agreement with that of the
satellite imageries.
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