NSW Nearshore Wave Model and Forecast System |

Case Study

NSW Nearshore Wave Model and Forecast System

Overview

Baird was commissioned (in partnership with Manly Hydraulics Laboratory) by The New South Wales Office of Environment and Heritage (OEH) to develop a state-wide nearshore wave transformation tool capable of providing long-term wave hindcasts, forecasts, and design conditions.

Project Highlights

A global to local wave model using Baird’s suite of industry-leading wave calculation tools (including the latest unstructured version of WAVEWATCH III™ (WW-III)) was developed to predict a set of high-quality wave conditions that formed the basis of a wave spectra transfer function. Wave transformation functions using both parametric and full spectral transfer models were developed and verified against offshore and inshore wave buoy data, resulting in excellent validation metrics. Optimized for the NSW Government’s high-performance computer system, the toolbox is available as a web-based interface for OEH planners and policy makers, providing NSW with its first statewide view of high-resolution nearshore wave conditions for forecast, near real-time measurements, and long-term design statistics. Additional information is available here and here.

Project Challenges:

A large project area, covering over 2000 km of coastline, needed to be accounted for
Required to provide high-resolution output for future planning activities
Large computational resources were required to develop the system algorithms

Project Solutions:

The forecasting tool Baird developed had the equivalent accuracy to a 3rd generation wave model but required less than 1% of the computational effort, proving to be highly efficient
Extensive calibration and validation completed verifying accuracy and performance
Models were optimized for high-performance computing

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