The Guayas Estuary and sea level corrections to calculate flooding areas for climate change scenarios

The Guayas estuary is the inner area of the Gulf of Guayaquil, it holds a water body of around 5000 km2 and the Puna island divides the water flow in two main streams : El Morro and Estero Salado Channel (length: 90 Km.) and Jambeli and Rio Guayas Channel (length: 125km.). The geometry of the estuarine system with the behavior of the tidal wave (semidiurnal) makes tidal amplitude higher at the head than at the mouth, whereas the wave crest at the head is delayed from one and a half to two hours from that at the mouth and sea level recorded by gages along the estuary are all different because of the wave propagation and mean sea level (msl) calculated for each gage show differences with that of La Libertad which is the base line for all altitudes on land (zero level). A leveling and calculations were made to correct such differences in a way that all gages (msl) records were linked to La Libertad and this in turn allowed a better estimates of flooding areas and draw them on topographic maps where zero level corresponds to the mean sea level at La Libertad. The procedure and mathematical formulation could be applied to any estuary or coastal area and it is a useful tool to calculate such areas especially when impacts are on people or capital goods and related to climate change scenarios.