1.1.1

• coast is a narrow zone where land meet sea and interacts. they change as a result of land, atomosphere, sea, and human processes
• littoral zone:

  • from highest sea level line to shallow offshore waters
  • divided into backshore, foreshore, nearshore, and offshore
  • contains many coastal sediments
  • sediment is moved by waves, currents, and tides
• backshore is beyond the influence of waves and sand dunes form
• offshore water is too deep for waves to breal
• foreshore is the most dynamic zone inc erosion and deposition
• nearshore is the inter-tidal zone
• sediment cells:

  • 11 sediment cells england and wales movement is self-contained
  • closed sub-system material is recycled
  • boundaries determined by shape of coastline directing the movement of sediment in cell
  • headlands and peninsulas natural barriers
  • change in wind can affect movement high under conditions sediment move offshore
  • manage coastal zone
  • model effect of change
• steady state equilibrium inputs and outputs are equal and there is little change
• metastable equilibrium caused by dramatic event that brings abotu change and adjustement
• dynamic equilibrium is gradual and long term change
• A sediment budget is the balance between changes in the volume of sediment held within the system and the volume of sediment entering or leaving the system.

  A positive budget is when there are more inputs than outputs to the system and a negative budget is when outputs are higher than inputs. 

  Accretion = growth of depositional features, e.g a beach 

  Denudation =  erosion process of breaking and removal of rock/ sediment
• Clasticfragments of rock (from very large boulders to individual quartz mineral grains)

  • Biogenicremains of shells and corals