Coastal Systems Flashcards
What is Dynamic Equilibrium?
Where a natural system tries to achieve a balance by making constant changes in response to a constantly changing system
What sort of system is a coast?
The coast is as an open system
What factors interrupt dynamic equilibrium?
human interventions or natural variations
Name some sediment sources in the coast?
- rivers
- cliff erosion
- wind
- glaciers
- offshore
- longshore drift
Inputs into the coastal system
- Sediment from rivers
- Sea level changes
- Wave energy
- Sediment from waves
- Sediment from cliffs/beaches
- Human activity
Outputs into the coastal system
- Sediment removed beyond local sediment cells
- Coastal landforms of deposition
- Accumulation of sediment above the tidal limit
-Coastal landforms of erosion - Dissipation of wave energy
Stores of the coastal system
- Wave erosion
- Deposition
- Transport of sediment e.g. from longshore drift
- Movement of sediment by the wind
- Coastal landforms of erosion
- Coastal landforms of deposition
components of the coastal system
● Beaches
● Sand Dunes
● Spits
● Bars and Tombolos
● Headlands and Bays
● Nearshore Sediment
● Cliffs
● Wave-cut Notches
● Wave-cut Platforms
● Caves
● Arches
● Stacks
transfers of the coastal system
Wind-blown sand
● Mass-movement processes
● Longshore drift
● Weathering
● Erosion
● Transportation
● Deposition
positive feedback in the coastal system
waves erode the cliff, granular material will be released, which may scrape the shore platform, resulting in even more cliff erosion
negative feedback in the coastal system
decrease in wave energy entering the coastal zone could lead to deposition of sediment offshore, further reducing wave energy as more wave energy is lost to friction.
