EGU22-12057
https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-egu22-12057
EGU General Assembly 2022
© Author(s) 2022. This work is distributed under
the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.

Dynamics in Marine Protected Areas in the German Bight (North Sea) under different forcing scenarios

Sara Rubinetti1,2, Vera Fofonova1,2, Alexey Androsov1,3, Ivan Kuznetsov1, Johannes Josef Rick2, Finn Mielck2, Lasse Sander2, and Karen Helen Wiltshire2
Sara Rubinetti et al.
  • 1Alfred Wegener Institute, Helmholtz Centre for Polar and Marine Research, 27570 Bremerhaven, Germany
  • 2Alfred Wegener Institute, Helmholtz Centre for Polar and Marine Research, 25992 List/Sylt , Germany
  • 3Shirshov Institute of Oceanology RAS, 117997 Moscow, Russia

This study is dedicated to the dynamics in Marine Protected Areas (MPAs) in the German Bight under different forcing scenarios. A large amount of data has been collected in the North Sea over the last decades to characterize MPAs, which can shed light on long-term changes in the North Sea dynamics from abiotic part to ecosystem. At the moment, a question is raised about the interconnection between MPAs and their representativeness for the larger area. Nowadays, this issue can be resolved with the existing numerical instruments and accumulated observations. We paid particular attention to the tidal dynamics in the North Sea since tidal residual circulation and asymmetric tidal cycles significantly define circulation patterns, transport and accumulation of biogeochemical material, and the distribution of bedforms in this relatively shallow region. We analyzed in detail the tidal energy transformation and the role of higher harmonics in the domain. The tidal ellipses, maximum tidally induced velocities, energy fluxes and residual circulation maps are constructed and analyzed. The numerical tool used in this study is the FESOM-C model (Androsov et al., 2019), which works with triangular, rectangular or mixed grids and is equipped with a wetting/drying option. A grid with a resolution of up to 10 meters in the flooded areas is used.

Androsov, A., Fofonova, V., Kuznetsov, I., Danilov, S., Rakowsky, N., Harig, S., Brix, H., and Wiltshire, K. H.: FESOM-C v.2: coastal dynamics on hybrid unstructured meshes, Geoscientific Model Development, 12, 1009-1028, 10.5194/gmd-12-1009-2019, 2019.

 

How to cite: Rubinetti, S., Fofonova, V., Androsov, A., Kuznetsov, I., Rick, J. J., Mielck, F., Sander, L., and Wiltshire, K. H.: Dynamics in Marine Protected Areas in the German Bight (North Sea) under different forcing scenarios, EGU General Assembly 2022, Vienna, Austria, 23–27 May 2022, EGU22-12057, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-egu22-12057, 2022.