Coastal erosion and accretion in Kuwait – Problems and management strategies

Kuwait is a coastal country with 496 km coast. It is located in the Arabian Peninsula, at the north-western part of Arabian Gulf. Many coastal infrastructures are close to high water line and hence attract erosion, especially in the south. The northern part is significantly dominated by sedimentation. Remote sensing is used to identify the hot spot of erosion and accretion. Kuwait does not have good quality natural stones and needs to be imported from other countries for any coastal structure project and is expensive. Hence innovative coastal protection solutions, which are cost competitive, environment friendly, easy to fabricate, install and reorient, are needed. Geo-bags, filled with sand are field tested. New type of floating breakwaters are developed which has reduced width compared to conventional pontoon breakwaters, by introducing skirt walls at the keel of the floating breakwater. It is found that material saving of more than 60%–75% is possible when compared to rubble mound offshore breakwaters. Many coastal infrastructures in the northern part of Kuwait are suffering due to sedimentation. Detailed field, lab and numerical modeling studies were carried out to understand the sedimentation problem and for providing solutions to reduce the degree of accretion in the marinas and seawater intake structures. Work is in progress for rolling out the Integrated Coastal Zone Management Plan for Kuwait.