✅COASTS 3.1.3.1 - Coasts as Natural Systems Flashcards
What type of system is the coast?
An open system
What effect can feedbacks have on a system?
They can increase or decrease available inputs or outputs as well as enabling equilibrium
What type of events alter the coastline on a short term basis?
Storms
What can dynamic equilibrium be affected by over geological (longer) time periods?
Supply of sand
Energy of the waves
Sea level change
Location of the shoreline
What is a landform?
Individual features which are created by coastal processes
What is a landscape?
The entire area of sea, coastline and immediate land behind the sea front. Within the landscape are characteristic landforms
What are flows/transfers?
Processes of movement within a system
What are stores/components?
Parts of a system not necessarily in motion
What are some of the inputs into the coastal system?
waves, tides, currents
Wind
Precipitation
Fluvial (river) Sediment
human pollution
What are some of the flows/transfers in the coastal system?
Erosion
weathering
Longshore drift
Mass movement
Ocean currents
Riptides
transportation
deposition
What are some of the outputs from the coastal system?
Evaporation
Sediment transfer
tides, waves, currents
What are some of the feedbacks in the coastal system?
Coastal management increasing erosion rates elsewhere
Mass movement decreasing erosion
What are some of the stores in the coastal system?
Beaches
Sand dunes
Spits, bars, tombolos
cliffs, headlands, bays
wave-cut notch platforms
What is a sediment budget?
The amount of sediment in a sediment cell. Assesses gains & losses of sediment.
What is a sediment Cell?
Areas of coast where the movement of sediment is almost contained and flows in dynamic equilibrium, a closed system. There are 11 on coast of England and Wales. Often enclosed by physical features like headlands. Can be divided into subcells.
