Chapter 9 - Environmental Flows

Abstract

Environmental flows are defined as flows in domains that have a size that allows an ecological system to be sustainable. This may range from a few millimeters for the life of an algal cell to a few hundred kilometers defining an ecosystem as a whole. From a dynamical system perspective this means that for the smallest domain size the fluid is mostly governed by a viscous pressure balance and at the largest domain size the balance is between pressure, buoyancy, Coriolis forces. In this chapter I treat both steady and unsteady motions in a domain where the earth's rotation and the water column density stratification are important.