Impact of exchange flows on wetland flushing
Name
Nepf-2001-Impact of exchange flows.pdf
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773.67 KB
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Author(s)
Nepf, Heidi
Andradottir, Hrund O.
Date Issued
December 2001
Journal
Water Resources Research
Publisher
American Geophysical Union
Citation
Andradottir, Hrund O., and Heidi M. Nepf. “Impact of exchange flows on wetland flushing.” Water Resources Research 37.12 (2001) ©2001 American Geophysical Union
Version
Final published version
Abstract
The flushing of littoral regions is governed by barotropic river flows, QR, and baroclinic exchange flows, ΔQ. This note presents field observations of two different flushing regimes in a shallow wetland that borders a lake. In spring, when river flows are high, the wetland circulation is river- or jet-dominated, ΔQ/QR < 1, and the river short- circuits through the wetland in a much shorter time than the nominal residence time. During summer low flows, however, the wetland circulation is dominated by exchange flows, ΔQ/QR > 1, that vary both on diurnal and synoptic (10–20 days) timescales in response to differential heating and cooling between the wetland and lake and to wind. These exchange flows can enhance wetland flushing by a factor of 10 relative to river flushing. A one-dimensional decoupled heat and flow model represents diurnal exchange flows in this system well and may be used to assess the importance of exchange flows in other systems.
MIT Department
Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering
Terms of Use
Article is made available in accordance with the publisher's policy and may be subject to US copyright law. Please refer to the publisher's site for terms of use.
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DOI of Published Version
https://doi.org/10.1029/2001WR000257
