NEMO

NEMO is a coastal engineering research project which is going to give us unprecedented insights into the complex processes along our coast with an innovative field campaign and strategic process based numerical modelling.

Passionate research in the NeMo domain

On the 31st of March the first findings of the research around the Sand Engine are presented at a conference in Kijkduin. The Sand Engine is located in our NeMo domain and Nemo team members Marcel, Jaap and Sierd illustrate some of the methods and importance of our research in the video.

The Sand Motor - Passionate Research

The Sand Engine Churns to Bring Sand to the Beach

Article in Cobouw: Sand Engine - monitoring - Matthieu de Schipper on jet ski

Ter Heijde - Nederlandse onderzoekers zijn nog lang niet uitgestudeerd op de Zandmotor. Specialisten van talloze disciplines bijten hun tanden stuk op de experimentele zandplaat voor de kust van Ter Heijde.

Article in Cobouw: Professor Stive reflects back on 1.5 year Sand Engine

Ter Heijde - De Zandmotor heeft in de eerste anderhalf jaar van zijn bestaan minder zand verloren dan gedacht. De sterke plaatselijke stromingen blijven vooral een kwestie van goed opletten.

1st test round with the Multicopter!

Tide around the Sand Engine
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The water level at sea continuously changes in a 12 hour cycle around mean sea level: the tidal cycle. Around the Sand Engine, the water level varies over a range of about 2m: the tidal range (lower figure). The pictures on the left show the Sand Engine at low tide (upper figure) and high tide (middle figure). During flood (increasing water levels) the water enters the basin through the channels surrounding the Sand Engine. The water isolates the Sand Engine from the main land temporarily turning it into an island. At high tide, the Sand Engine is largely inundated. In any coastal area it is important to realize that these areas are highly dynamic. When entering the Sand Engine at low tide, it is important to realize that water depth will increase in time (up to 35cm/hour!). Therefore it is more safe to enter the Sand Engine during ebb (decreasing water levels). It gives you time to return safely to the main land.

Tide predictions can be found online at getij.nl

NEMO funding

The NeMo project is funded through the European Research Council within the seventh framework programme (FP7)

NEMO Lander news
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The NEMO Lander was successfully deployed on the 11th of Feb! The instrumented frame was installed at 12 m depth offshore the Sand Engine (see video of the deployment) as a part of a combined effort between the NEMO project and the STW sustainable ROFI project. The experiment was named as STRAINS (STRAtification Impacts on the Nearshore Sediment transport) whose PI's are prof. Marcel Stive (TUDelft, NL), prof. Julie Pietrzak (TUDelft, NL), Prof. Alexander Horner-Devine (Univ. of Washington, US) and Prof. Alejandro Sousa (National Oceanography Centre, UK).

The STRAINS aims to investigate the Rhine river influence on the suspended sediment along a transect from -18 to -12 m NAP (Normal Amsterdam Water Level). The project intends to determine the vertical stratification caused by the Rhine river discharge during two entire neap-spring tidal cycles and its correlation to the sediment transport.

The NEMO Lander was deployed with the purpose to measure concentration profiles, flow velocity profiles and directional waves. The set of instruments installed on the rig encompass: 2 high resolution down-looking current profilers (Aquadopp HR); 2 down-looking 3-D current meters (Vector), 1 Sediment Profiler (ABS), 1 up-looking current profiler (Aquadopp). The new dataset we hope to collect is meant to give new insights into the physics of lhydrodynamics and sediment transport on the middle shoreface.

Doployment of NEMO lander

NEMO team has big meeting

The NEMO-team had a scientific meeting yesterday with some esteemed coastal scientist from the Netherlands and abroad. From America we were joined by Rob Holman and Mick Haller.