Economically Optimised Breakwater Design at Exposed Location

Design of breakwaters at exposed location is a very challenging task, especially when the construction budget is tight and for a thorough minimisation and optimisation of rock quantities and gradations in order not to exceed the available budget.

This paper presents a project where an economical and robust breakwater design was developed using traditional two layer rock armour and well-known and well-proven construction methods. Focus on constructability issues and available rock types and sizes in the market at a very early stage were essential in order to develop a design which also the bidding contractors found to be relatively ‘easy’ to construct, although the environmental conditions at the site were very challenging.