OSIL BUOY MONITORS COASTAL EROSION

Global marine systems manufacturer, Ocean Scientific International (OSIL), has supplied a data buoy platform to the ‘Orion’ joint research and development centre for use as a real-time monitoring station on an EU-funded project managing coastal erosion.

The Harmonized Coastal Corrosion Management Framework for Enhancing the Implementation of the Integrated Coastal Zone Management Protocol (HERMES) project required a platform with the ability to record a full profile of water column currents, tidal variations, wave parameters and estimated suspended particular matter concentrations, with the data transmitted to a base station on land in real time.

The OSIL 1.2m Tern buoy offers a high visibility platform with a GPRS communication system ideally suited to the installation location given the proximity to the shore and a popular wreck diving site.

The robust buoy is equipped with a seabed mounted Nortek AWAC to provide three-dimensional current profiles in cells with thicknesses from 0.25 to 4m. The acoustic Doppler current profiler is additionally furnished with a Prolog board for internal wave processing, and can also be used to estimate suspended sediment loads.

The base station software provided by OSIL gives the end users control over the data displayed from the monitoring buoy, highlighting OSIL’s ability to tailor individual buoy systems to meet specific project requirements.