THE PHYSICAL BASIS OF THE MILD-SLOPE WAVE EQUATION

The mild-slope wave equation is derived "by demanding minimum in total wave energy. By demanding conservation of wave energy, two different functionals for the finite element solution of the mild-slope wave equation are constructed. The first functional is based on a finite/infinite element formulation, and the second one is "based on a hybrid finite element formulation. Both functionals are constructed in a straight-forward way that leads to a better physical understanding of the functionals and a full understanding of each separate part of them.