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This page was updated on 14th May 2026.

COASTAL RESEARCH was established in 1996 by Dr Michael J. Fennessy as an independent consultancy in marine science, specifically physical processes.
Over thirty years it has surveyed and advised on many coastal sites across South West England, using academic experience of rivers, estuaries and inshore coastal waters. The range of rock types along the coastline has significance for beach evolution and cliff stability. Fluvial and tidal dynamics respond to geological formations and contibute to the effects of sediment transport. Weather events interact dramatically.
Although most projects has been conducted in Devon, Cornwall, Dorset and Somerset, field investigations in Wales, Scotland, Ireland, The Netherlands, Germany, Svalbard, Iceland, Canada and Antarctica have enhanced the total experience.
Economic use of coastlines and inshore waters has changed over the last two centuries. The increasing density of the population along coastlines has led to property and business values creating tensions. Although relative sea level rise is in the region of 1 to 2 mm a year, political histeria has exaggerated some consequences and ignored others. More attention needs to be paid to extreme weather events
Many years ago fishermen had a unique understanding of the local tidal and meteorological conditions, but that long experience is beginning to be lost, only to be replaced by ill-conceived ideas of incomers and bureaucrats.
The Cornish apply the word Emmet to summer visitors! Quiet hilarity erupts when a visiting car is parked on a beach, only to be returned to when the tide has come in!
Local knowledge and experience is crucial when any study of a coastal area is undertaken.
Today we have a range of measurement tools and mathematical techniques to assist the understanding of physical coastal processes.