We study the relevance of various scalar equations, such as inviscid Burgers’, Korteweg-de Vries (KdV), extended KdV, and higher order equations (of Camassa-Holm type), as asymptotic models for the propagation of internal waves in a two-fluid system. These scalar evolution equations may be justified with two approaches. The first method consists in approximating the flow with two decoupled, cou...