On the shoaling of solitary waves in the KdV equation

Abstract

The waveheight change in surface waves with a sufficiently slow variation in depth is examined. Using a new formulation of the energy flux associated to waves modeled by the Korteweg-de Vries equation, a system of three coupled equations is derived for the determination of the local wave properties as waves propagate over gently changing depth. The system of equations is solved numerically, and the resulting shoaling curves are compared to previous results on long wave shoaling.