WorldWaves is a state-of-the-art software package, developed by Fugro OCEANOR, NTUA (Greece) and ISDGM (Italy) with funding over a number of years from the Dutch dredging industry and within the framework of various European Commission sponsored contracts, notably WorldWaves, EnviWave and Eurowaves. The system simplifies the modelling of wave conditions in coastal waters, resulting in more timely, lower cost but reliable data.
In WorldWaves, the following are integrated under a single Matlab toolbox:
- High quality long-term wave data offshore all global coasts
- Global bathymetric and coastline data.
- Two shallow water wave models: SWAN, the third generation state-of-the art wave model and a backward ray-tracing model, CWAVERAY
- Sophisticated offshore and nearshore wave statistics toolboxes.
- A geographic module allowing the user to easily zoom in on geographic maps together with tools to assist the user in setting up the model grid.
- A bathymetry editing tool allowing easy editing of the bathymetric data.
- A facility allowing users to easily import their own offshore wave data.
A full description of WorldWaves can be found in the product user manual. Please ask if you would like to review the manual and we will provide you with a download link.
We are convinced that the offshore WorldWaves wave and wind model data are the highest quality data available anywhere and our calibration against satellite altimeter data in every point ensures that the offshore data used as boundary conditions to the WorldWaves shallow water modelling is bias-free (please read the accompanying page concerning the for more information).
WorldWaves is completely modular and packages can be put together to fit the client’s needs. Due mainly to the cost of the offshore data, a global package would be prohibitively expensive for all but the largest companies. However, you can purchase the global software package at very low cost and purchase site-specific data from us as the need arises. Several clients have purchased regional versions or systems for particular countries. Please ask for a quote.
The WorldWaves statistical module
Offshore and nearshore statistical modules are very similar and are treated together here. Both work on the time series of wave and wind parameters (from the offshore database or, following a run of one of the shallow water models, nearshore). In the following, we show a series of statistical graphs and tables to illustrate what is possible. Any presentation can also be made on a monthly or seasonal basis.
The WorldWaves shallow water modelling
With the WorldWaves coastal modelling tools, it takes only a couple of minutes to zoom into an area from a global map, set up a computational area and start a run of the Swan model or a backward raytracing model, Cwaveray (less accurate but can provide a long-term nearshore series in minutes. The SWAN model (version 40.51) is a state-of-the-art third-generation fully numerical spectral wave model, developed for the calculation of propagation of random waves in coastal regions and inland waters and accounts for shoaling, refraction, wave propagation, wave generation by wind, triad and quadruplet non-linear wave-wave interactions, whitecapping, bottom friction, and depth-induced breaking. The default bathymetric data under WorldWaves (from DBDB-V) should be updated/checked before doing a serious wave study. We can supply high quality bathymetry on a case-by-case basis. It is easy to replace these bathymetric data in WorldWaves. SWAN can either be run as a single run (user defined offshore boundary conditions for one point in time) or as a time series run. In the latter case, WorldWaves takes the offshore boundary conditions from the offshore data base each 6 hours and outputs nearshore time series of Hs, Tm, Tp and direction (optionally full directional spectra time series can be applied offshore and output nearshore).
It is also easy to import and analyse statistically wave parameter data from the user’s own wave buoys or other wave measuring instrumentation. The following parameters may be included: Hs, Tm, Tp and wave direction (as well as separate wind sea and swell parameters) and wind speed and direction data. The wind data drive the local wind sea development in the models.
Upon completion of a time series run of SWAN under WorldWaves, one can either analyse the nearshore data statistically using the WorldWaves statistical module or export the time series files generated for external analysis.
Some screen pictures from a model run off Ireland is shown below:
For the Swan model, a nested grid is set up around the target location at higher resolution.
Fields of Hs from a single run of the Swan model, indicating the spatial variability of the wave energy for an offshore SW storm.
Fields of wave energy period from the same single run of the Swan model as above
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Directional wave spectrum at the target point
