Publications

Rusu, L. and Guedes Soares, C. (2015), “Impact of assimilating altimeter data on wave predictions in the western Iberian coast”, Ocean Modelling, Vol. 96, pp. 126-135

The present work describes the implementation of a methodology for the assimilation of the altimeter data in a wave forecast system based on the optimal interpolation method. The target is to improve the wave predictions in the western Iberian coast produced by a wave modelling system based on WAM, for the wave generation, and on SWAN for the coastal transformation, that delivers daily wave predictions. The data assimilation scheme is implemented to generate the analysis fields for the significant wave height. The methodology proposed is applied to hindcasts and for validation purpose and then to operational forecast. The impact of the data assimilation scheme on the wave predictions has been evaluated. The corrections are applied to the output of the SWAN model, and consequently, the data assimilation scheme is executed independently of the model simulations. The procedure considered uses the observations provided by multi satellite altimeter data. On the other hand, both satellite data and in situ observations were used for the quality assessment. The results show that the assimilation scheme works correctly and all statistical parameters are better predicted in the case of the assimilated significant wave height scalar field. As expected, by increasing the amount of the data assimilated, the reliability of the wave predictions is enhanced. Keywords: data assimilation; altimeter measurements; numerical modelling; SWAN; western Iberian coast

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