High‐order compact numerical schemes for non‐hydrostatic free surface flows

The development of a numerical scheme for non‐hydrostatic free surface flows is described with the objective of improving the resolution characteristics of existing solution methods. The model uses a high‐order compact finite difference method for spatial discretization on a collocated grid and the standard, explicit, single step, four‐stage, fourth‐order Runge–Kutta method for temporal discretization. The Cartesian coordinate system was used. The model requires the solution of two Poisson equations at each time‐step and tridiagonal matrices for each derivative at each of the four stages in a time‐step. Third‐ and fourth‐order accurate boundaries for the flow variables have been developed including the top non‐hydrostatic pressure boundary. The results demonstrate that numerical dissipation which has been a problem with many similar models that are second‐order accurate is practically eliminated. A high accuracy is obtained for the flow variables including the non‐hydrostatic pressure. The accuracy of the model has been tested in numerical experiments. In all cases where analytical solutions are available, both phase errors and amplitude errors are very small. Copyright © 2006 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Further experiences with computing non‐hydrostatic free‐surface flows involving water waves

A semi‐implicit, staggered finite volume technique for non‐hydrostatic, free‐surface flow governed by the incompressible Euler equations is presented that has a proper balance between accuracy, robustness and computing time. The procedure is intended to be used for predicting wave propagation in coastal areas. The splitting of the pressure into hydrostatic and non‐hydrostatic components is utilized. To ease the task of discretization and to enhance the accuracy of the scheme, a vertical boundary‐fitted co‐ordinate system is employed, permitting more resolution near the bottom as well as near the free surface. The issue of the implementation of boundary conditions is addressed. As recently proposed by the present authors, the Keller‐box scheme for accurate approximation of frequency wave dispersion requiring a limited vertical resolution is incorporated. The both locally and globally mass conserved solution is achieved with the aid of a projection method in the discrete sense. An efficient preconditioned Krylov subspace technique to solve the discretized Poisson equation for pressure correction with an unsymmetric matrix is treated. Some numerical experiments to show the accuracy, robustness and efficiency of the proposed method are presented. Copyright © 2004 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

A depth‐integrated non‐hydrostatic finite element model for wave propagation

This paper presents a two‐dimensional finite element model for simulating dynamic propagation of weakly dispersive waves. Shallow water equations including extra non‐hydrostatic pressure terms and a depth‐integrated vertical momentum equation are solved with linear distributions assumed in the vertical direction for the non‐hydrostatic pressure and the vertical velocity. The model is developed based on the platform of a finite element model, CCHE2D. A physically bounded upwind scheme for the advection term discretization is developed, and the quasi second‐order differential operators of this scheme result in no oscillation and little numerical diffusion. The depth‐integrated non‐hydrostatic wave model is solved semi‐implicitly: the provisional flow velocity is first implicitly solved using the shallow water equations; the non‐hydrostatic pressure, which is implicitly obtained by ensuring a divergence‐free velocity field, is used to correct the provisional velocity, and finally the depth‐integrated continuity equation is explicitly solved to satisfy global mass conservation. The developed wave model is verified by an analytical solution and validated by laboratory experiments, and the computed results show that the wave model can properly handle linear and nonlinear dispersive waves, wave shoaling, diffraction, refraction and focusing. Copyright © 2013 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Founding editor Dr Philip M. Gresho

A numerical technique is presented for the approximation of vertical gradient of the non‐hydrostatic pressure arising in the Reynolds‐averaged Navier–Stokes equations for simulating non‐hydrostatic free‐surface flows. It is based on the Keller‐box method that take into account the effect of non‐hydrostatic pressure with a very small number of vertical grid points. As a result, the proposed technique is capable of simulating relatively short wave propagation, where both frequency dispersion and non‐linear effects play an important role, in an accurate and efficient manner. Numerical examples are provided to illustrate this; accurate wave characteristics are already achieved with only two layers. Copyright © 2003 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Three‐dimensional modeling of non‐hydrostatic free‐surface flows on unstructured grids

A three‐dimensional numerical model is presented for the simulation of unsteady non‐hydrostatic shallow water flows on unstructured grids using the finite volume method. The free surface variations are modeled by a characteristics‐based scheme, which simulates sub‐critical and super‐critical flows. Three‐dimensional velocity components are considered in a collocated arrangement with a σ‐coordinate system. A special treatment of the pressure term is developed to avoid the water surface oscillations. Convective and diffusive terms are approximated explicitly, and an implicit discretization is used for the pressure term to ensure exact mass conservation. The unstructured grid in the horizontal direction and the σ coordinate in the vertical direction facilitate the use of the model in complicated geometries. Solution of the non‐hydrostatic equations enables the model to simulate short‐period waves and vertically circulating flows. Copyright © 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

A conservative semi‐implicit method for coupled surface–subsurface flows in regional scale

A semi‐implicit method for coupled surface–subsurface flows in regional scale is proposed and analyzed. The flow domain is assumed to have a small vertical scale as compared with the horizontal extents. Thus, after hydrostatic approximation, the simplified governing equations are derived from the Reynolds averaged Navier–Stokes equations for the surface flow and from the Darcy's law for the subsurface flow. A conservative free‐surface equation is derived from a vertical integral of the incompressibility condition and extends to the whole water column including both, the surface and the subsurface, wet domains. Numerically, the horizontal domain is covered by an unstructured orthogonal grid that may include subgrid specifications. Along the vertical direction a simple z‐layer discretization is adopted. Semi‐implicit finite difference equations for velocities and a finite volume approximation for the free‐surface equation are derived in such a fashion that, after simple manipulation, the resulting discrete free‐surface equation yields a single, well‐posed, mildly nonlinear system. This system is efficiently solved by a nested Newton‐type iterative method that yields simultaneously the pressure and a non‐negative fluid volume throughout the computational grid. The time‐step size is not restricted by stability conditions dictated by friction or surface wave speed. The resulting algorithm is simple, extremely efficient, and very accurate. Exact mass conservation is assured also in presence of wetting and drying dynamics, in pressurized flow conditions, and during free‐surface transition through the interface. A few examples illustrate the model applicability and demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed algorithm. Copyright © 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Analysis of efficient preconditioned defect correction methods for nonlinear water waves

Robust computational procedures for the solution of non‐hydrostatic, free surface, irrotational and inviscid free‐surface water waves in three space dimensions can be based on iterative preconditioned defect correction (PDC) methods. Such methods can be made efficient and scalable to enable prediction of free‐surface wave transformation and accurate wave kinematics in both deep and shallow waters in large marine areas or for predicting the outcome of experiments in large numerical wave tanks. We revisit the classical governing equations are fully nonlinear and dispersive potential flow equations. We present new detailed fundamental analysis using finite‐amplitude wave solutions for iterative solvers. We demonstrate that the PDC method in combination with a high‐order discretization method enables efficient and scalable solution of the linear system of equations arising in potential flow models. Our study is particularly relevant for fast and efficient simulation of non‐breaking fully nonlinear water waves over varying bottom topography that may be limited by computational resources or requirements. To gain insight into algorithmic properties and proper choices of discretization parameters for different PDC strategies, we study systematically limits of accuracy, convergence rate, algorithmic and numerical efficiency and scalability of the most efficient known PDC methods. These strategies are of interest, because they enable generalization of geometric multigrid methods to high‐order accurate discretizations and enable significant improvement in numerical efficiency while incuring minimal storage requirements. We demonstrate robustness using such PDC methods for practical ranges of interest for coastal and maritime engineering, that is, from shallow to deep water, and report details of numerical experiments that can be used for benchmarking purposes. Copyright © 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

An efficient curvilinear non‐hydrostatic model for simulating surface water waves

An efficient curvilinear non‐hydrostatic free surface model is developed to simulate surface water waves in horizontally curved boundaries. The generalized curvilinear governing equations are solved by a fractional step method on a rectangular transformed domain. Of importance is to employ a higher order (either quadratic or cubic spline function) integral method for the top‐layer non‐hydrostatic pressure under a staggered grid framework. Model accuracy and efficiency, in terms of required vertical layers, are critically examined on a linear progressive wave case. The model is then applied to simulate waves propagating in a canal with variable widths, cnoidal wave runup around a circular cylinder, and three‐dimensional wave transformation in a circular channel. Overall the results show that the curvilinear non‐hydrostatic model using a few, e.g. 2–4, vertical layers is capable of simulating wave dispersion, diffraction, and reflection due to curved sidewalls. Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Non‐hydrostatic 3D free surface layer‐structured finite volume model for short wave propagation

In this paper a layer‐structured finite volume model for non‐hydrostatic 3D environmental free surface flow is presented and applied to several test cases, which involve the computation of gravity waves. The 3D unsteady momentum and mass conservation equations are solved in a collocated grid made of polyhedrons, which are built from a 2D horizontal unstructured mesh, by just adding several horizontal layers. The mesh built in such a way is unstructured in the horizontal plane, but structured in the vertical direction. This procedure simplifies the mesh generation and at the same time it produces a well‐oriented mesh for stratified flows, which are common in environmental problems. The model reduces to a 2D depth‐averaged shallow water model when one single layer is defined in the mesh. Pressure–velocity coupling is achieved by the Semi‐Implicit Method for Pressure‐Linked Equations algorithm, using Rhie–Chow interpolation to stabilize the pressure field. An attractive property of the model proposed is the ability to compute the propagation of short waves with a rather coarse vertical discretization. Several test cases are solved in order to show the capabilities and numerical stability of the model, including a rectangular free oscillating basin, a radially symmetric wave, short wave propagation over a 1D bar, solitary wave runup on a vertical wall, and short wave refraction over a 2D shoal. In all the cases the numerical results are compared either with analytical or with experimental data. Copyright © 2008 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

A new fully non‐hydrostatic 3D free surface flow model for water wave motions

A new fully non‐hydrostatic model is presented by simulating three‐dimensional free surface flow on a vertical boundary‐fitted coordinate system. A projection method, known as pressure correction technique, is employed to solve the incompressible Euler equations. A new grid arrangement is proposed under a horizontal Cartesian grid framework and vertical boundary‐fitted coordinate system. The resulting model is relatively simple. Moreover, the discretized Poisson equation for pressure correction is symmetric and positive definite, and thus it can be solved effectively by the preconditioned conjugate gradient method. Several test cases of surface wave motion are used to demonstrate the capabilities and numerical stability of the model. Comparisons between numerical results and analytical or experimental data are presented. It is shown that the proposed model could accurately and effectively resolve the motion of short waves with only two layers, where wave shoaling, nonlinearity, dispersion, refraction, and diffraction phenomena occur. Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

An implicit numerical algorithm for solving non‐hydrostatic free‐surface flow problems

Details are given of the development of a two‐dimensional vertical numerical model for simulating unsteady free‐surface flows, using a non‐hydrostatic pressure distribution. In this model, the Reynolds equations and the kinematic free‐surface boundary condition are solved simultaneously, so that the water surface elevation can be integrated into the solution and solved for, together with the velocity and pressure fields. An efficient numerical algorithm has been developed, deploying implicit parameters similar to those used in the Crank–Nicholson method, and generating a block tri‐diagonal algebraic system of equations. The model has been applied to simulate a range of unsteady flow problems involving relatively strong vertical accelerations. The results show that the numerical algorithm described is able to produce accurate predictions and is also easy to apply. Copyright © 2001 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

An implicit three‐dimensional fully non‐hydrostatic model for free‐surface flows

An implicit method is developed for solving the complete three‐dimensional (3D) Navier–Stokes equations. The algorithm is based upon a staggered finite difference Crank‐Nicholson scheme on a Cartesian grid. A new top‐layer pressure treatment and a partial cell bottom treatment are introduced so that the 3D model is fully non‐hydrostatic and is free of any hydrostatic assumption. A domain decomposition method is used to segregate the resulting 3D matrix system into a series of two‐dimensional vertical plane problems, for each of which a block tri‐diagonal system can be directly solved for the unknown horizontal velocity. Numerical tests including linear standing waves, nonlinear sloshing motions, and progressive wave interactions with uneven bottoms are performed. It is found that the model is capable to simulate accurately a range of free‐surface flow problems using a very small number of vertical layers (e.g. two–four layers). The developed model is second‐order accuracy in time and space and is unconditionally stable; and it can be effectively used to model 3D surface wave motions. Copyright © 2004 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Three‐dimensional numerical modelling of free surface flows with non‐hydrostatic pressure

A three‐dimensional numerical model is developed for incompressible free surface flows. The model is based on the unsteady Reynolds‐averaged Navier–Stokes equations with a non‐hydrostatic pressure distribution being incorporated in the model. The governing equations are solved in the conventional sigma co‐ordinate system, with a semi‐implicit time discretization. A fractional step method is used to enable the pressure to be decomposed into its hydrostatic and hydrodynamic components. At every time step one five‐diagonal system of equations is solved to compute the water elevations and then the hydrodynamic pressure is determined from a pressure Poisson equation. The model is applied to three examples to simulate unsteady free surface flows where non‐hydrostatic pressures have a considerable effect on the velocity field. Emphasis is focused on applying the model to wave problems. Two of the examples are about modelling small amplitude waves where the hydrostatic approximation and long wave theory are not valid. The other example is the wind‐induced circulation in a closed basin. The numerical solutions are compared with the available analytical solutions for small amplitude wave theory and very good agreement is obtained. Copyright © 2002 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

A two‐dimensional vertical non‐hydrostatic σ model with an implicit method for free‐surface flows

An implicit finite difference model in the σ co‐ordinate system is developed for non‐hydrostatic, two‐dimensional vertical plane free‐surface flows. To accurately simulate interaction of free‐surface flows with uneven bottoms, the unsteady Navier–Stokes equations and the free‐surface boundary condition are solved simultaneously in a regular transformed σ domain using a fully implicit method in two steps. First, the vertical velocity and pressure are expressed as functions of horizontal velocity. Second, substituting these relationship into the horizontal momentum equation provides a block tri‐diagonal matrix system with the unknown of horizontal velocity, which can be solved by a direct matrix solver without iteration. A new treatment of non‐hydrostatic pressure condition at the top‐layer cell is developed and found to be important for resolving the phase of wave propagation. Additional terms introduced by the σ co‐ordinate transformation are discretized appropriately in order to obtain accurate and stable numerical results. The developed model has been validated by several tests involving free‐surface flows with strong vertical accelerations and non‐linear waves interacting with uneven bottoms. Comparisons among numerical results, analytical solutions and experimental data show the capability of the model to simulate free‐surface flow problems. Copyright © 2004 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

A horizontally curvilinear non‐hydrostatic model for simulating nonlinear wave motion in curved boundaries

A horizontally curvilinear non‐hydrostatic free surface model that embeds the second‐order projection method, the so‐called θ scheme, in fractional time stepping is developed to simulate nonlinear wave motion in curved boundaries. The model solves the unsteady, Navier–Stokes equations in a three‐dimensional curvilinear domain by incorporating the kinematic free surface boundary condition with a top‐layer boundary condition, which has been developed to improve the numerical accuracy and efficiency of the non‐hydrostatic model in the standard staggered grid layout. The second‐order Adams–Bashforth scheme with the third‐order spatial upwind method is implemented in discretizing advection terms. Numerical accuracy in terms of nonlinear phase speed and amplitude is verified against the nonlinear Stokes wave theory over varying wave steepness in a two‐dimensional numerical wave tank. The model is then applied to investigate the nonlinear wave characteristics in the presence of dispersion caused by reflection and diffraction in a semicircular channel. The model results agree quantitatively with superimposed analytical solutions. Finally, the model is applied to simulate nonlinear wave run‐ups caused by wave‐body interaction around a bottom‐mounted cylinder. The numerical results exhibit good agreement with experimental data and the second‐order diffraction theory. Overall, it is shown that the developed model, with only three vertical layers, is capable of accurately simulating nonlinear waves interacting within curved boundaries. Copyright © 2011 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

An efficient and accurate non‐hydrostatic model with embedded Boussinesq‐type like equations for surface wave modeling

A novel approach that embeds the Boussinesq‐type like equations into an implicit non‐hydrostatic model (NHM) is developed. Instead of using an integration approach, Boussinesq‐type like equations with a reference velocity under a virtual grid system are introduced to analytically obtain an analytical form of pressure distribution at the top layer. To determine the size of vertical layers in the model, a top‐layer control technique is proposed and the reference location is employed to optimize linear wave dispersion property. The efficiency and accuracy of this NHM with Boussinesq‐type like equations (NHM‐BTE) are critically examined through four free‐surface wave examples. Overall model results show that NHM‐BTE using only two vertical layers is capable of accurately simulating highly dispersive wave motion and wave transformation over irregular bathymetry. Copyright © 2008 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

A semi‐implicit finite difference method for non‐hydrostatic,free‐surface flows

In this paper a semi‐implicit finite difference model for non‐hydrostatic, free‐surface flows is analyzed and discussed. It is shown that the present algorithm is generally more accurate than recently developed models for quasi‐hydrostatic flows. The governing equations are the free‐surface Navier–Stokes equations defined on a general, irregular domain of arbitrary scale. The momentum equations, the incompressibility condition and the equation for the free‐surface are integrated by a semi‐implicit algorithm in such a fashion that the resulting numerical solution is mass conservative and unconditionally stable with respect to the gravity wave speed, wind stress, vertical viscosity and bottom friction. Copyright © 1999 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Numerical computation of three‐dimensional incompressible Navier–Stokes equations in primitive variable form by DQ method

In this paper, the global method of differential quadrature (DQ) is applied to solve three‐dimensional Navier–Stokes equations in primitive variable form on a non‐staggered grid. Two numerical approaches were proposed in this work, which are based on the pressure correction process with DQ discretization. The essence in these approaches is the requirement that the continuity equation must be satisfied on the boundary. Meanwhile, suitable boundary condition for pressure correction equation was recommended. Through a test problem of three‐dimensional driven cavity flow, the performance of two approaches was comparatively studied in terms of the accuracy. The numerical results were obtained for Reynolds numbers of 100, 200, 400 and 1000. The present results were compared well with available data in the literature. In this work, the grid‐dependence study was done, and the benchmark solutions for the velocity profiles along the vertical and horizontal centrelines were given. Copyright © 2003 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Numerical simulation of a single bubble by compressible two‐phase fluids

The present work deals with the numerical investigation of a collapsing bubble in a liquid–gas fluid, which is modeled as a single compressible medium. The medium is characterized by the stiffened gas law using different material parameters for the two phases. For the discretization of the stiffened gas model, the approach of Saurel and Abgrall is employed where the flow equations, here the Euler equations, for the conserved quantities are approximated by a finite volume scheme, and an upwind discretization is used for the non‐conservative transport equations of the pressure law coefficients. The original first‐order discretization is extended to higher order applying second‐order ENO reconstruction to the primitive variables. The derivation of the non‐conservative upwind discretization for the phase indicator, here the gas fraction, is presented for arbitrary unstructured grids. The efficiency of the numerical scheme is significantly improved by employing local grid adaptation. For this purpose, multiscale‐based grid adaptation is used in combination with a multilevel time stepping strategy to avoid small time steps for coarse cells. The resulting numerical scheme is then applied to the numerical investigation of the 2‐D axisymmetric collapse of a gas bubble in a free flow field and near to a rigid wall. The numerical investigation predicts physical features such as bubble collapse, bubble splitting and the formation of a liquid jet that can be observed in experiments with laser‐induced cavitation bubbles. Opposite to the experiments, the computations reveal insight to the state inside the bubble clearly indicating that these features are caused by the acceleration of the gas due to shock wave focusing and reflection as well as wave interaction processes. While incompressible models have been used to provide useful predictions on the change of the bubble shape of a collapsing bubble near a solid boundary, we wish to study the effects of shock wave emissions into the ambient liquid on the bubble collapse, a phenomenon that may not be captured using an incompressible fluid model. Copyright © 2009 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.