Estuarine, Coastal and Shelf Science 259 (2021) 107484

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Estuarine, Coastal and Shelf Science

journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/ecss

Estimating current-related bed shear stresses during flooding phase on

intertidal flats from measured water depths
Beibei Xu a, d, Zheng Gong a, b, *, Changkuan Zhang a, b, Shaotong Zhang c, d, Qian Zhang a, b
a
State Key Laboratory of Hydrology-Water Resources and Hydraulic Engineering Hohai University, Nanjing, 210098, China
b
Jiangsu Key Laboratory of Coast Ocean Resources Development and Environment Security, Hohai University, Nanjing, 210098, China
c
Shandong Provincial Key Laboratory of Marine Environment and Geological Engineering, College of Environmental Science and Engineering, Ocean University of China,
Qingdao, 266100, China
d
School of Civil Engineering, The University of Queensland, Brisbane, 4072, Australia

A R T I C L E I N F O A B S T R A C T

Keywords: Current-related bed shear stress is vital for the prediction of the morphological evolution of intertidal flats. The
Current-related bed shear stress present study develops a simple method to estimate the current-related bed shear stress during the flood phase on
Water depths intertidal flats, which is based on the easy-to-measure water depth. To verify this simple method, comparisons
Intertidal flats
were made to the current-related shear stress derived from both the LP and the TKE methods based on the
Flood phase
measured velocities. The results show that the widely used approach on intertidal flats, which relates the current-
related bed shear stress to the square of the depth-averaged velocity with a constant factor, underestimates the
bed shear stress for water depths smaller than ca. 0.5 m when high sediment concentrations and significant bed-
level changes however usually occur. For water depths smaller than approximately 0.5 m, the uniform horizontal
velocity assumption in the vertical direction in the shallow water theory is inappropriate, and velocity shear must
be considered. The current-related bed shear stresses could be estimated using the measured water depths during
flood phase, even when the water depth is smaller than 0.5 m. The developed method also shows that the scale of
current-related shear stress is u/h, not u2 , at least with a water depth smaller than 0.5 m.

1. Introduction current-related bed shear stress related to the depth-averaged velocity is

an insufficient model in very shallow environments, e.g.,O’Donoghue
Significant current-related bed shear stresses occur with the arrival et al. (2010). The bottom boundary layer can extend highly to the water
of tidal flow during the flooding phase on intertidal flats when the water surface due to very shallow water depths, making the use of the
depth is very shallow (~0.1–0.5 m) compared to the width of intertidal depth-averaged velocity to estimate the current-related bed shear stress
flats (~5 km), e.g., Zhang et al. (2016) and Zhang et al. (2018). These inappropriate.
significant bed shear stresses can cause massive sediment transported, The τ can also be inferred from velocity profiles or fluctuating ve­
and the resultant bed level changes during these very shallow water locities, e.g., Shi et al. (2019); Zhu et al. (2016); Andersen et al. (2007);
stages can contribute to 35% of the bed level changes during one tidal Verney et al., 2006; Biron et al., 2004). However, the bed roughness
cycle (Shi et al., 2017, 2019). The resultant significant bed erosion can from the log-fit (LP) to the velocity profiles in unsteady flow is larger
even destroy the marine benthic community (Ysebaert et al., 2003; than the actual bed roughness for the same bed (O’Donoghue et al.,
Miller et al., 2002; Tuck et al., 2000). Hence, it is crucial to accurately 2010; Nielsen, 2016) and is highly variable (e.g., Collins et al., 1998).
predict the bed shear stress during these very shallow water stages. The method using fluctuating velocities dramatically relies on detailed
The current-related bed shear stress (τ) is usually related to the measurements of velocity turbulence (Soulsby, 1983). These short­
square of the depth-averaged velocity with a constant factor, e.g., comings limit the applications of the methods using velocity profiles or
Friedrichs and Aubrey (1996); Pritchard and Hogg (2003); Roberts et al. fluctuating velocities in the sediment transport model. Therefore, a more
(2000), due to that the shallow water theory is usually applied for practical approach that can be easily used in the sediment model is
intertidal flats to adapt its large cross-shore length scale. However, the expected.

* Corresponding author. State Key Laboratory of Hydrology-Water Resources and Hydraulic Engineering Hohai University, Nanjing, 210098, China.
E-mail address: [email protected] (Z. Gong).

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ecss.2021.107484
Received 13 August 2020; Received in revised form 9 April 2021; Accepted 21 June 2021
Available online 29 June 2021
0272-7714/© 2021 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
B. Xu et al. Estuarine, Coastal and Shelf Science 259 (2021) 107484

Fig. 1. (a) Map of the Jiangsu coast. The study area is indicated by the red box. (b) Map of the study area on intertidal flats. The field survey station is indicated by
the yellow star. (For interpretation of the references to colour in this figure legend, the reader is referred to the Web version of this article.)

intertidal flats is 2–6 km, and the average slope is 0.1–0.3% (Zhang,
1992; Kuai et al., 2021). The study area is famous for having the largest
radial tidal sand ridges, which protect the intertidal flats from large
waves. The nearshore area is controlled by a semi-diurnal tide with an
average tidal range of 3.68 m. Abundant sediment is supplied from the
abandoned Yellow River delta. The bed sediment fines landward and
comprises a mixture of clay, silt, and very fine sand.

2.2. Fieldwork

Field observations were conducted during spring tides on 24–26

December 2015 when the weather is mild. Based on previous observa­
tions of bed elevations (Gong et al., 2017), station S7 was chosen for
hydrodynamics observations, as indicated by the yellow star in Fig. 1b.
Station S7 is located in the middle intertidal zone. Water depths,
near-bed velocities, and wave parameters were sampled simultaneously.
A Nortek Vectrino Profiler (Fig. 2) was used to capture near-bed
velocity profiles at a sampling frequency of 25 Hz with a resolution of
1 mm and 3.5 cm range in the vertical direction. The transducer of the
Vectrino Profiler was installed 10 cm above the initial seabed, and the
measured velocity profile was thus from 2.5 cm to 6 cm above the initial
Fig. 2. The insitu photo of the deployment of devices. seabed. A three-stage post-processing technique was conducted to
remove the noise in the measured velocities (Chanson et al., 2008).
Wave parameters and water depths were measured by the RBR
In this study, to solve the τ during the flooding phase on intertidal
flats, especially when the intertidal flats are just submerged (water company Tide Wave Recorder-2050 (TWR). The pressure sensors of the
TWR were mounted 5 cm from the initial seabed and were programmed
depth smaller than ca. 0.5 m in the present study), the easy-to-measure
water depths were used to estimate the τ based on the method of Frie­ to measure the water depth every minute. Wave parameters were
measured at an interval of 5 min using 2 Hz measurements over a 256-s
drichs and Aubrey (1996). To verify this simple method, field observa­
tions were conducted on intertidal flats in the centre of the Jiangsu period.
coast, China. Both LP and turbulent kinetic energy (TKE) methods were
used to calculate τ based on the measured velocities. Finally, the τ values 2.3. Estimation of bed shear stress
estimated from the water depths were compared to those estimated from
the measured velocities. 2.3.1. The method proposed in the present work
The wavelength of the tide is much larger than the width of intertidal
2. Field measurement flats. The water surface on intertidal flats during the flooding phase of
the tide is nearly horizontal. The slope of the intertidal flats is very
2.1. Study area gentle. Thus, the horizontal water surface and linear seabed are
reasonable approximations for intertidal flats. The velocity at any
The study area is located on intertidal flats in the centre of the location of intertidal flats can be obtained according to the mass balance
Jiangsu coast, China, see the red box in Fig. 1a. The average width of the equation under the assumptions of horizontal water surface and linear
seabed (Friedrichs and Aubrey, 1996), which is given by:

2
B. Xu et al. Estuarine, Coastal and Shelf Science 259 (2021) 107484

relates bed shear stress to the depth-averaged velocities is thus given by:
[ ]2
dη(t)
τ1 (x, t) = ρCD u2 (x, t) = ρCD (2)
tan θdt

where ρ = 1024 kg/m3 is seawater density and CD is the drag coefficient.

It is noted that the depth-averaged velocity is uniform in the x-direction
at a fixed time. The τ1 is thus also uniform, i.e., τ1 (x,t) = τ1 (t). However,
at a fixed time, the water depth decreases landward, resulting in a
landward variation in the velocity gradient at the sea bed, see the red
velocity profiles in Fig. 3, similar to the velocities near the tip of viscous
dam-break flow, see Figure. 4 of Andreini et al. (2012). The velocity
gradient at the sea bed increases landward and maximum at the
land-water boundary. To describe the landward variations of the ve­
locity gradient, a straightforward self-similar velocity profile (Nielsen,
Fig. 3. Schematic side view of linearly sloping intertidal flats. 2018) is introduced in the present work,
⎛ ⎞
xf (t) − x dη(t) 1 dη(t)
(1) (3)
z
u(x, t) = = u(x, z, t) = u∞ (x, t) × ⎝1 − e− δ(x,t) ⎠
h(x, t) dt tan θ dt

where u(x, t) (m/s) is the depth-averaged horizontal velocity, t (s) is

where u∞ (x, t) (m/s) is the asymptotic velocity and δ(x, t) (m) is the
time, xf (m) is the location of the land-water boundary, θ (◦ ) is the angle
boundary layer thickness. The boundary layer thickness of flow is pro­
between the intertidal flats and the horizontal direction, and η(t) (m) is
portional to the flow period. For tide whose period is up to 12.5 h, the
the water surface level, as illustrated in Fig. 3.
boundary layer thickness is on the order of 100–101 m. Thus, the flow
Eq. (1) has been tested on intertidal flats, even with complicated
during the flooding phase of the tide on intertidal flats is inside the
geometries (Le Hir et al., 2000). However, near the land-water bound­
boundary layer, i.e., δ(x, t) = h(x, t). The asymptotic velocity, u∞ , thus
ary, i.e., near xf in Fig. 3, the main controlling factor in the propagation
can be determined:
of tidal currents along the exposed seabed is bed friction, e.g.,Whitham
(1955). The surface elevation may present a significant slope. The sig­ h(x,t)
∫
nificant slope only occurs at the land-water boundary (Le Hir et al., u(x, z, t)dz = u(x, t)h(x, t) (4)
2000; Pritchard and Hogg, 2003), which is not included in the present 0
study.
The widely used approach on intertidal flats in the model e.g., which gives
Pritchard and Hogg (2003) and Friedrichs and Aubrey (1996), that
u∞ (x, t) = eu(x, t) (5)

Fig. 4. Time series of measured water depths, the near-bed velocities at the level of 6 cm above the initial seabed, and wave heights during three different tidal
cycles. The velocities were averaged over 1 min.

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B. Xu et al. Estuarine, Coastal and Shelf Science 259 (2021) 107484

Fig. 5. Velocity profiles over 1.5 cm during the first 30 min of the first tidal cycle after the land-water boundary passed the observation station and the corresponding
linear fitting lines. The velocity data were averaged over 2 min.

Finally, the bed shear stress is given by: velocity (u) is a combination of velocity from two components: the
time-averaged mean currents (ut ) and turbulences (u ):
′
⃒
∂u(x, z, t)⃒⃒ eu(x, t) ρeν dη(t)
τ2 (x, t) = ρν = ρν = (6)
∂z ⃒z=zb h(x, t) h(x, t)tan θ dt u = ut + u
′
(7)

where ν (m2/s) is the nominal eddy viscosity and zb (m) is the elevation The effects of waves on the fluctuating velocities were minimized
of the seabed. During one tidal cycle, the maximum bed level changes using the spectrum method (e.g., MacVean and Lacy, 2014). The TKE is
are on the order of 1 cm, see Figure 13 of Shi et al. (2017), which is much the sum of the variance of those fluctuating velocities:
smaller than the width of intertidal flats (~2–6 km). The slope of 1 ( )
intertidal flats thus remains nearly constant during one tidal cycle. The TKE = ρ u′ 2 + v′ 2 + w′ 2 (8)
2
τ2 is dependent on the easy-to-measure parameter, i.e., water depth, and
the nominal eddy viscosity, ν, is the only tuning parameter. where u v , and w (m/s) are the turbulent velocities in the x, y, and z
′ ′ ′

directions, respectively. The simple relationship between the TKE and

2.3.2. Existing methods for comparisons the shear stress is given in the turbulence models, e.g., Galperin et al.
The τ on intertidal flats can also be obtained using TKE or LP methods (1988):
based on the measured velocities e.g., Shi et al. (2017); Zhu et al. (2016);
τTKE = C × TKE (9)
MacVean and Lacy (2014) and Andersen et al. (2007). The instant

Fig. 6. Comparison of bed shear stresses using different methods during the flood phase of the tide in (a) the first tidal cycle, (b) the second tidal cycle, and (c) the
third tidal cycle, with tan(θ) = 0.001, ν = 3.6 × 10− 5 m2/s and CD = 0.003. Both the values of ν and CD were chosen as the best fit value.

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B. Xu et al. Estuarine, Coastal and Shelf Science 259 (2021) 107484

where C is a constant, and a value of 0.19 is suggested by Kim et al. Table 1

The index of agreement between time series of bed shear stress from different
(2000).
methods.
In the bottom boundary, the vertical velocity structure is considered
to be logarithmically distributed and can be described by the Karman- Data series ILP-Eq(6) ITKE-Eq(6)

Prandtl model (Dyer, 1986): 1st tidal cycle 0.38 0.60

2nd tidal cycle 0.75 0.74
u* z − zb
ut (z − zb ) = ln (10) 3rd tidal cycle 0.93 0.92
κ z0

whereut (z)(m/s) is the time-averaged current velocity at level z, u∗ (m/s) shown in Fig. 6. With the arrival of the tide flood, the maximum bed
is the friction velocity, z0 (m) is the bed roughness height, and κ = 0.4 is shear stress occurred. The maximum τ from the measured velocities
von Karman’s constant. When examining the measured velocity profiles ranged from 1.5 to 2.8 Pa, see the blue and black lines in Fig. 6. With the
for a logarithmic profile, the correlation coefficient was checked at the increase of water depth, τ decreased with time and gradually dropped to
95% confidence level. The velocity was averaged over 1 min to minimize zero.
the effects of waves. The bed shear stress can be related to u* using the During the first tidal cycle, τ2 can give a good fit to τLP or τTKE before
following equation: 19:50. After 19:50, τ2 underestimated the bed shear stress. A similar
deviation between τ2 and τLP (or τTKE ) was also found in the second tidal
τLP = ρu2* (11)
cycle. However, this deviation decreased from the first to the second
tidal cycle and disappeared in the third tidal cycle. This corresponded to
2.3.3. Index of agreement
the increase in agreement index I from the first to the third tidal cycles,
The differences between time series of bed shear stresses from
see Table 1.
different methods are quantified using the index of agreement I (Will­
The τ1 underestimated the bed shear stress for water depths smaller
mott et al., 1985), given by:
than ca. 0.5 m, indicating that the τ∝u2 is not a sufficient model for
∑n
(Hi − Ki ) water depths smaller than 0.5 m, which is consistent with O’Donoghue
IH− K = 1 − ∑ (⃒⃒ i=1 ⃒⃒ ⃒⃒ ⃒) (12)
n
−
⃒
K ⃒ + ⃒Ki − K ⃒ et al. (2010). The water depth of 0.5 m is also consistent with the depth
i=1 ⃒Hi
above which the horizontal velocity is relatively uniform in the vertical
direction, see Section 4.2, indicating that the velocity shear has to be
where Ki and Hi are the i-th time series of τ from different methods. The
taken into consideration for water depth small than 0.5 m in terms of bed
index of agreement I varies from 0 to 1. I = 0 represents complete
shear stress. With the water depth rising to 0.5 m above, τ1 is consistent
disagreement, and I = 1 means perfect agreement.
with τ2 .
The Vectrino Profiler was installed 5 cm higher than the TWR. No
3. Results
velocity data were obtained when the water depth was from 5 cm to 10
cm. Within a water depth of 5 cm–10 cm, the τ2 increased sharply and
3.1. Near-bed velocities, water depths, and wave heights
seemed to be infinite at the land-water boundary. This is because the
dynamics at the land-water boundary are different from the following
The measured water depths, near-bed velocities, and wave heights
water column, e.g., see Figure 12 of Baldock et al. (2014). A rolling
are shown in Fig. 4. The maximum water depths during each tidal cycle
motion of water exists at the land-water boundary, and the water col­
varied from 2.3 m to 2.8 m. The waves generally grew during the
umn could impact the seabed, resulting in a significant impact force on
incoming tide and then decreased during high and falling tidal phases.
the seabed, which is not included in the present study.
The maximum wave heights, which gradually decreased from the first to
the third tidal cycle, were 0.42 m, 0.19 m and 0.08 m, respectively. The
near-bed velocities had several peaks during the tidal phase. The 4. Discussion
maximum near-bed velocity during the tidal cycle occurred at the land-
water boundary and then decreased rapidly and levelled out to Our results suggest that the current-related bed shear stress during
approximately 0.2 m/s. The largest velocities occurring at the land- the flood phase on intertidal flats can be estimated using measured
water boundary are consistent with other reports, e.g., Figure 20 of water depths.
Wüthrich et al. (2018). The near-bed velocities finally dropped to zero at The index of agreement I between τ2 and τLP (or τTKE ) increases from
flood slack. The hydrodynamics during the ebb tide was not included in the first tidal cycle to the third tidal cycle. The explanation for this is that
the present study. the effects of waves are not included in the present approach, i.e., Eq.
(6). The LP method could overestimate the current-related bed shear
stress when the wave exists e.g., Zhang et al. (2018) and Yang et al.
3.2. Vertical gradient of horizontal velocity (2006). The contributions of wave-induced turbulence also make the
TKE method overestimate the current-related bed shear stress. There­
Fig. 5 shows the velocity profiles over 1.5 cm during the first 30 min fore, with the decrease in wave height from the first to the third tidal
of the first tidal cycle. The vertical gradient of horizontal velocity cycle, I increases. The I can be up to 0.92 with a maximum wave height
decreased with time after the passage of the land-water boundary. After smaller than 0.08 m, indicating that the current-related bed shear stress
16 min, at which time the corresponding water depth was ca. 0.5 m, the can be well described by Eq. (6).
horizontal velocity is relatively uniform in the vertical direction, see As mentioned in the literature review, shallow water theory has been
dashed line in Fig. 5. Although the velocity at the seabed was not widely applied for intertidal flats. The current-related bed shear stress is
measured, with the no-slip conditions at the seabed, we can deduce that thus related to the square of the depth-averaged velocity with a constant
the gradient of the horizontal velocity at the seabed also decreased with
friction factor, i.e., τ∝u2 . However, our study shows that τ∝u2 is
time after the passage of the land-water boundary. This decrease could
insufficient at least for water depths lower than 0.5 m during the
lead to the decrease of τ with time, see the black and blue lines in Fig. 6.
flooding phase when velocity shear had to be taken into account.
The developed simple method, i.e., Eq. (6), has superiority in solving
3.3. Bed shear stresses the current-related bed shear stress for water depths smaller than 0.5 m
and has a straightforward form that can be easily applied in the model.
The τ values during the flooding phase of the three tidal cycles are Although the self-similar velocity profiles are not the definitive,

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B. Xu et al. Estuarine, Coastal and Shelf Science 259 (2021) 107484

CRediT authorship contribution statement

Beibei Xu: Field observations, Formal analysis, Data curation,

Writing – original draft. Zheng Gong: Conceptualization, Supervision.
Changkuan Zhang: Conceptualization, Supervision. Shaotong Zhang:
Writing – review & editingWriting-Reviewing and Editing. Qian Zhang:
Data curation.

Declaration of competing interest

The authors declare that they have no known competing financial

interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence
the work reported in this paper.

Acknowledgements

The authors would like to thank Professor Peter Nielsen for his useful
Fig. 7. Spatial variations of the current-related bed shear stress on the inter­
tidal flats at a fixed time t.
suggestions for improving this manuscript. Beibei Xu gratefully ac­
knowledges financial support from the China Scholarship Council. This
work was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of
integrated description of 2DV velocity structure on intertidal flats, the
China (51620105005, 51879095,41807229) and China National Funds
application of self-similar velocity profiles implies that the τ∝ u/ h, at
for Distinguished Young Scientists (51925905). Qian Zhang acknowl­
least for water depths lower than ca. 0.5 m during the flood phase, which
edges the National Natural Science Foundation of China (51909073).
helps understand the hydrodynamics in the corresponding flooding
phase better.
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