A Study on the Influence of the Saemangeum Sluice-Gates Effluent Discharge using the Particle Tracking Model

Abstract

This study suggested a method calculating the influence of effluent discharge from Saemangeum sluice-gates using the particle tracking model. For 2017, we presented the seasonal effects of effluent discharge as probability spatial distributions and compared with the results of the water age, one of the indicators of transport time scale. The influence of sluice-gates effluent discharge increases radially around Sinshi or Gaseok gates, which are expected to be biased toward the south in winter and north in summer due to the effect of seasonal winds. Although the results of the prediction are limited to the 2017 situation, the method of calculating the influence of sluice-gates effluent discharge using the Lagrangian particle tracking model can be used to predict the future of the around Saemangeum.

Coastal environmental changes after the Saemangeum seawall construction

“…Based on the Korea Meteorological Administration (KMA) (https:// data.kma.go.kr), the precipitation increases in summer (from July to September, 22.95 ± 8.20 cm) and decreasing in winter (from January to March, 3.81 ± 1.33 cm) (Wang et al, 2017) (Figure 2A). As a result, the Saemangeum seawall discharges a larger volume of freshwater during the summer (63.95 ± 34.62 m 3 s -1 ) than during winter (20.86 ± 8.83 m 3 s -1 ) (Oh and Choi, 2015;Cho et al, 2020) (Figure 2B). Moreover, freshwater causes lower sea surface density, resulting in strong stratification inside and outside the Saemangeum seawall (Oh and Choi, 2015).…”

“…These results can be attributed to reduced oxygen solubility in Warming trend is major factor in increasing precipitation, which can influence salinity changes by enhancing river discharge through floods during the summer season (Wang et al, 2017;Park and Sin, 2022). Therefore, we compared rainfall data obtained from the KMA for the nearest location (Gunsan) to the study area with discharge data calculated according to Cho et al (2020). Precipitation peaked in 2018 and 2020, and the river discharge outflow from the inner (brackish water) to the outer (seawater) areas was also significantly enhanced (Figure 9).…”