The nature of British Columbia coastal and inland waterways affords many locations where floating breakwaters are or could be used to protect small-craft harbours from wave action. A field survey of many of the current breakwater sites is undertaken in order to establish qualitative performance criteria of various designs. A two-dimensional numerical model is developed to predict the oscillatory response and wave transmission characteristics for a number of common breakwater designs. Finally, experiments with two configurations of breakwater models were carried out in the Hydraulics Laboratory at the University of British Columbia. The experiments were designed to validate the numerical model and to estimate viscous damping coefficients required in the numerical solution. / Applied Science, Faculty of / Civil Engineering, Department of / Graduate