Xu, Y.; Zhang, W.; Chen, X.; Zheng, J.; Chen, X., and Wu, H., 2015. Comparison of analytical solutions for salt intrusion applied to the Modaomen Estuary.

Salt intrusion in estuaries is an urgent environmental challenge across the world, because salinity influences water quality. The Modaomen Estuary is the main source of freshwater supply in the economically advanced Pearl River Delta, and it is experiencing a salt intrusion problem. Analytical models of salinity variation offer a simple and efficient approach to studying salt intrusion in estuaries. In this paper, two analytical models used worldwide to assess salinity variation in alluvial estuaries are applied to the Modaomen Estuary. The models are derived from salt convection-dispersion equations, with different assumptions for the dispersion coefficient. The performance of these two models was evaluated by comparing their results with field measurements; this revealed that both analytical models apply well to both the estimation of salinity distribution and the prediction of salt intrusion in the Modaomen Estuary. One model agrees more with the field measurements of salinity distribution along the estuary; the second better predicts salt intrusion length.