The INDIA Project is motivated primarily by a requirement to improve understanding of the interacting hydrodynamic and sedimentological processes at work in the European coastal zone and to develop improved methodologies to predict changes in morphology. Undertaking such a study requires a dynamic natural field site where processes are sufficiently active to result in observable changes in the physical environment over a time span commensurate with a realistic field campaign.
The INDIA project has identified tidal inlet entrances and adjacent coastlines as being dynamic, natural features especially suited for such investigations. Tidal inlet entrances act as sites of water, sediments, nutrients and pollutant exchange between lagoons and estuaries and the oceans and are known to be especially sensitive to human intervention on the adjacent coasts and to environmental changes (e.g. sea level rise) in the connecting tidal basins.
