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SAMC
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• ANNUAL REPORT 2013
Coastal Technology
Constructions situated in Arctic coastal regions face several challenges including land-
falls, harbours and LNG facilities. High erosion rates, erosion mechanisms that are not
yet fully understood, permafrost soils, remoteness, wave exposure and ice abrasion are
amongst these, not to mention the lack of local soils and bed rock suitable for construction
purposes. On the horizon also lingers the issue of climate change. Will a warming climate
cause more unstable permafrost soils and higher erosion rates? How could climate
change affect our structures in their service lifetime? This is a general outline of the
challenges facing the SAMCoT coastal technology research area.
SAMCoT research focuses on establishing a better
understanding of the erosion processes, both terrestrial
as well as the interaction with the coastal processes.
The aim is to understand Arctic coastal erosion as well
as predict future erosion rates. This understanding is
vital for the planning of landfalls and other infrastruc-
ture along the Arctic coasts. Further, research has been
done on how to build coastal protection structures and
coastal infrastructure in general in such areas with
their high erosion rates and scarce availability of local
construction materials.
In order to address these general challenges according
to the industry partners’ needs for innovation, several
research projects have been carried out, addressing:
• Terrestrial erosion mechanisms
• Coastal erosion processes
• Erosion protection
• Construction materials
• Climate change and coastal destruction
Of particular significance for this work has been the
field data gathering in the field data obtained by the field
data gathering in group working on data collection and
process modelling from Varandey (onshore data) and
Vestpynten (offshore data). This is valuable for data
series on coastal and terrestrial processes in Arctic
coastal erosion.
Especially, the insights from the basic research on
permafrost soil parameters and behaviour and on
climatic data and coastal data gathering, including
wave, current and ice load data from field sites proved
essential. These data series are crucial to build not
only erosion (prediction) models but also to develop
construction materials and coastal protection struc-
tures that are tailor-made to sustain this environment.
The data series are also of value for benchmarking the
frozen soil model.