Impact of naval traffic on the sediment transport of the Port of Genoa – a modelling study

Abstract. The action of propellers induced jets on the seabed of ports can be responsible of erosion and deposition of sediment around the port basin, potentially inducing important variations of the bottom topography in the medium to long time scales. Such dynamics constantly repeated for long periods can result in drastic reduction of ships' clearance – in the case of accretion – or might be a threat for the stability and duration of the structures – in the case of erosion. These sediment related processes are sources of problems for the port managing authorities, both for the safety of navigation and for the optimization of the management and maintenance activities of the ports' bottom and infrastructures.

In the present work we study the erosion and sediment transport induced by the action of the vessel propellers of naval traffic in the passenger Port of Genoa (Italy) by means of integrated numerical modeling and we propose a novel methodology and state of the art modeling science-based tools useful to optimize and efficiently plan the ports managing activities and the of maintenance of ports seabed.