Environmental Problems in Coastal Regions

Description

Coastal zones are particularly vulnerable to problems related to population growth and industrial and tourism activities. The resulting ecological, social and economic pressures lead to conflict between different areas. Effective strategies for management of coastal zones should therefore consider them as integrated systems in order to control their dynamic quality.One of the most serious problems affecting coastal areas is the damage resulting from oil and chemical spills. Numerous and frequent spills demonstrate the extent of the damage inflicted on the environment when a large volume of oil is released and, in particular, the susceptibility of the coastal region ecology to these spills.This book brings together papers presented at the Seventh International Conference on Environmental Problems in Coastal Regions including Oil and Chemical Spill Studies. The Meeting dealt with problems related to monitoring, analysis and modelling of coastal regions, including sea, land and air phenomena, and an important part of the Conference was the discussion of ecological and environmental problems, and the issues of water quality.The Conference also addressed topics related to soil and land spills, and comprised studies of modelling and the fate of oil and chemical slicks as well as the development of spill contingency plans and issues relative to prevention and clean-up measures. The papers presented cover the following topics: ecology and the coastal environment; water quality issues; sediment problems; erosion problems; coastal restoration; computational modelling; wetlands; remote sensing and radiation; atmospheric aspects and flooding; management of risk; automatic integrated modelling; coastal and inland environment; tourism impact.