Investigating the use of joint probability curves in coastal engineering practice

Hames, Dominic; Gouldby, Ben; Hawkes, Peter

Abstract

This paper investigates the inherent inaccuracy in the estimation of various extreme response variables (RVs) for different sea defence structures using joint exceedance curve approaches in common use around the UK. Utilising stochastically generated nearshore datasets that include extreme wave and sea-level conditions determined at regular intervals around the English coastline as part of a previous study, and asset information from the Environment Agency's Asset Information Management System database, this paper assesses 592 sea defence structures and their associated extreme response using different joint exceedance curve approaches when compared against the RV approach. This paper highlights that extreme RVs are often underestimated when using a joint exceedance curve approach, which in many cases can be significant. This suggests that the performance of many sea defence structures are incorrectly estimated. As a consequence, joint exceedance curve approaches may under-design sea defence structures to a greater level than previously indicated, or significantly underestimate extreme RVs when assessing the performance of existing structures.

• Journal Article Type: Article
• Acceptance Date: Mar 26, 2020
• Online Publication Date: Oct 9, 2020
• Publication Date: Sep 30, 2020
• Deposit Date: Sep 12, 2023
• Publicly Available Date: Sep 15, 2023
• Journal: Proceedings of the Institution of Civil Engineers: Maritime Engineering
• Print ISSN: 1741-7597
• Electronic ISSN: 1751-7737
• Publisher: Thomas Telford
• Peer Reviewed: Peer Reviewed
• Volume: 173
• Issue: 3
• Pages: 68-78
• Series ISSN: 1741-7597
• DOI: https://doi.org/10.1680/jmaen.2019.12
• Keywords: coastal engineering, risk & probability analysis, sea defences
• Public URL: https://uwe-repository.worktribe.com/output/11095328
• Additional Information: This paper won the 2021 ICE Halcrow Prize.