Hydro-environmental modelling of the Arabian Gulf and Kuwait Bay

Studying and understanding the hydro-environmental characteristics of the Arabian Gulf has received growing interest over the past few decades. This is mainly attributed to the strategic importance of the area, since it has been utilised to transport most of the oil production from the Gulf states. Over the last five decades, rapid industrial coastal development also has taken place around the Gulf. Development has brought desalination, power and petroleum refining plants. Coastal developments and industrial and domestic sewage discharges have contributed to the total nutrient levels in the Gulf, which have enhanced unwanted algal growth in various coastal areas. More recently, climate change has brought flooding to the Gulf states and frequent dust storms, which have increased various environmental issues, such as sediment transport and nutrient sorption processes, also in the shallow regions of the Gulf. In the current study the geographic dispersion of numerical tracers and flushing characteristics, in terms of residence time, of the Gulf have been investigated. The study has revealed that dispersion of numerical tracers is chiefly controlled by tides in the Gulf, while winds had limited effects. The residence time in the Gulf was predicted to be almost 3 years using ELCOM. Kuwait Bay was also investigated in terms of the governing hydrodynamics using ELCOM. Similar to the Gulf, the study revealed that the Bay was chiefly driven by tides and to a lesser extent by winds. Detailed studies of temperature, using the same model, showed that temperatures varied seasonally in the Bay. In terms of salinity, investigations have shown that the Shatt Al Arab has an apparent effect on the Bay's salinity, particularly in the northern areas. The maximum residence time of the Bay was calculated to be 57 days near al Jahra using ELCOM. The main model refinements were conducted on including the phosphorus source terms in TRIVAST, based on experimental investigations in a hydraulics flume channel. The refinements included the addition of new source terms accounting for the adsorption of phosphorus to suspended sediments and bed sediments. Model investigations have shown that the model refinements improved the model predictions of phosphorus levels, with phosphorus being the limiting nutrient during high suspended sediment events in Kuwait Bay. In general, good water quality predictions in Kuwait Bay were achieved using both ELCOM-CAEDYM and TRIVAST. Predictions have shown that the Shatt Al-Arab waterway has significant effects of the water quality of the Bay. Better hydrodynamic predictions were achieved using ELCOM than TRIVAST for the Gulf and the Bay. This was due to the additional mathematical terms included in ELCOM, including, in particular, the terms representing tidal forces that were calculated from the gravitational potential.EThOS - Electronic Theses Online ServiceGBUnited Kingdo

Hydro-environmental Characteristics of Seawater around Boubyan Island, Kuwait Using Annual Variations of Seawater Temperature, Salinity and Tide Fluctuations

The temporal and spatial variations of seawater temperature, salinity, and tidal fluctuations are important parameters for understanding the hydrodynamic, water quality, and marine biological activity in the seawater. It is also important to study and understand the probability and statistical aspects of these parameters for the planning and implementation of different types of marine projects. These parameters were measured at five different locations around Boubyan Island, Kuwait, for a span of almost one year during 2015-16. Based on the analysis of the measured data, it is found that the seawater salinity has varied from 34.14 to 48.31 ppt. The seawater temperature is also found to vary from 10.83 oC to 35.67 oC.  The seawater level has varied from -2.694 m to 2.378 m with respect to the mean sea level. It is found that the peak of the probability density of seawater level is flat valued, whereas the probability density of salinity and seawater temperature is multimodal.  A comparison of present and past measured seawater temperatures revealed that in Khor Al-Sabiya, the seawater temperature is increasing at the rate of 0.034 oC/year, which clearly indicates the effect of global warming. A similar study reveals that the annual average increase in salinity at Khor Al-Sabiya is 0.38 ppt, which clearly indicates a significant reduction of freshwater flow from Shatt Al-Arab into the Arabian Gulf.  Since Kuwait is investing in many projects around the Boubyan Island, the results of this study will be useful for the integrated and sustainable development of Boubyan and Failaka Islands in Kuwait

Effect of COVID-19 lockdown measures on the plastic waste generation trends and distribution of microplastics in the Northwestern Arabian/Persian Gulf

Microplastics (MPs) have been recognised as a persistent pollutant within environmental sinks, classed as a pollutant of priority in the Basel, Rotterdam and Stockholm (BRS) Conventions. In this work, we relate one of the longest COVID-19 recent pandemic lockdowns enforced in the State of Kuwait to the plastic waste generation and MPs accumulation which were released from a selected site known for leisure and fishing activities on the Northwestern part of the Arabian/Persian Gulf. After 15 days from the release, the coverage area was the widest for the distribution and transport plume of MPs. The particles were retained at known areas for fishing activities in Kuwait and were controlled by the hydrodynamics of the modelling configuration rather than the MPs release strength (i.e., number of particles). Moreover, during the period between January to April 2020; the MPs covered almost a double dispersed area which was linked to the hydrodynamics of the release model exercise. Generally, the most affected areas of the MPs distribution were along the Kuwait City coastline and the COVID-19 lockdown measures didn't affect the MPs particle distribution as much as environmental conditions

Numerical Prediction of Background Buildup of Salinity Due to Desalination Brine Discharges into the Northern Arabian Gulf

Brine discharges from desalination plants into low-flushing water bodies are challenging from the point of view of dilution, because of the possibility of background buildup effects that decrease the overall achievable dilution. To illustrate the background buildup effect, this paper uses the Arabian (Persian) Gulf, a shallow, reverse tidal estuary with only one outlet available for exchange flow. While desalination does not significantly affect the long-term average Gulf-wide salinity, due to the mitigating effect of the Indian Ocean Surface Water inflow, its resulting elevated salinities, as well as elevated concentrations of possible contaminants (such as heavy metals and organophosphates), can affect marine environments on a local and regional scale. To analyze the potential effect of background salinity buildup on dilutions achievable from discharge locations in the northern Gulf, a 3-dimensional hydrodynamic model (Delft3D) was used to simulate brine discharges from a single hypothetical source location along the Kuwaiti shoreline, about 900 km from the Strait of Hormuz. Using nested grids with a horizontal resolution, comparable to a local tidal excursion (250 m), far field dilutions of about 28 were computed for this discharge location. With this far field dilution, to achieve a total dilution of 20, the near field dilution (achievable using a submerged diffuser) would need to be increased to approximately 70. Conversely, the background build-up means that a near field dilution of 20 yields a total dilution of only about 12