A summary of European experience with shore nourishment

A recently completed European collaborative project focused on contributing to the improvement and harmonisation of present design practices for artificial nourishment schemes in Europe. An inventory of and a comparison between the major countries involved revealed significant differences between them regarding engineering methods and evaluation procedures, coastal zone management strategies and legal and financial frameworks. The design and evaluation methodologies were then reanalysed in order to provide harmonised recommendations. This analysis covered the monitoring and assessment of the performance of nourishment projects and the role of numerical models in design and evaluation. This paper summarises the conclusions obtained, uses two case studies as an illustration and gives a number of recommendations for achieving the objectives in the context of soft engineering works. The role of long-term monitoring at a regional scale is emphasised, advocating the use of innovative monitoring technologies together with the need for a better understanding and quantification of autonomous shoreline variability. Finally, suggestions for research are outlined, including such aspects as sediment grading and coupling between shoreline and profile change models. (C) 2002 Elsevier Science B.V All rights reserved.