Reconciling global mean and regional sea level change in projections and observations

AbstractThe ability of climate models to simulate 20th century global mean sea level (GMSL) and regional sea-level change has been demonstrated. However, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) Fifth Assessment Report (AR5) and Special Report on the Ocean and Cryosphere in a Changing Climate (SROCC) sea-level projections have not been rigorously evaluated with observed GMSL and coastal sea level from a global network of tide gauges as the short overlapping period (2007–2018) and natural variability make the detection of trends and accelerations challenging. Here, we critically evaluate these projections with satellite and tide-gauge observations. The observed trends from GMSL and the regional weighted mean at tide-gauge stations confirm the projections under three Representative Concentration Pathway (RCP) scenarios within 90% confidence level during 2007–2018. The central values of the observed GMSL (1993–2018) and regional weighted mean (1970–2018) accelerations are larger than projections for RCP2.6 and lie between (or even above) those for RCP4.5 and RCP8.5 over 2007–2032, but are not yet statistically different from any scenario. While the confirmation of the projection trends gives us confidence in current understanding of near future sea-level change, it leaves open questions concerning late 21st century non-linear accelerations from ice-sheet contributions.

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Contribution of Land Water Storage Change to Regional Sea-Level Rise Over the Twenty-First Century

Frontiers in Earth Science ◽

10.3389/feart.2021.627648 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 9 ◽

Author(s):

Sitar Karabil ◽

Edwin H. Sutanudjaja ◽

Erwin Lambert ◽

Marc F. P. Bierkens ◽

Roderik S. W. Van de Wal

Keyword(s):

Sea Level Rise ◽

Sea Level ◽

Climate Models ◽

Sea Level Change ◽

First Century ◽

Level Change ◽

Regional Sea Level ◽

Twenty First Century ◽

Land Water ◽

Global Mean

Change in Land Water Storage (LWS) is one of the main components driving sea-level rise over the twenty-first century. LWS alteration results from both human activities and climate change. Up to now, all components to sea-level change are usually quantified upon a certain climate change scenario except land water changes. Here, we propose to improve this by analyzing the contribution of LWS to regional sea-level change by considering five Coupled Model Intercomparison Project Phase 5 (CMIP5) climate models forced by three different Representative Concentration Pathway (RCP) greenhouse gas emission scenarios. For this analysis, we used LWS output of the global hydrological and water resources model, PCR-GLOBWB 2, in order to project regional sea-level patterns. Projections of ensemble means indicate a range of LWS-driven sea-level rise with larger differences in projections among climate models than between scenarios. Our results suggest that LWS change will contribute around 10% to the projected global mean sea-level rise by the end of twenty-first century. Contribution of LWS to regional sea-level rise is projected to be considerably larger than the global mean over several regions, up to 60% higher than global average of LWS-driven sea-level rise, including the Pacific islands, the south coast of Africa and the west coast of Australia.

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Regional sea level change prediction based on time-frequency analysis and intelligent algorithm

Remote Sensing and Modeling of Ecosystems for Sustainability XV ◽

10.1117/12.2320067 ◽

2018 ◽

Author(s):

Guanyu Ma ◽

Qing Zhao ◽

Maosi Chen

Keyword(s):

Sea Level ◽

Frequency Analysis ◽

Sea Level Change ◽

Intelligent Algorithm ◽

Time Frequency Analysis ◽

Time Frequency ◽

Level Change ◽

Regional Sea Level ◽

Change Prediction ◽

Regional Sea Level Change

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Constructing scenarios of regional sea level change using global temperature pathways

Environmental Research Letters ◽

10.1088/1748-9326/9/11/115007 ◽

2014 ◽

Vol 9 (11) ◽

pp. 115007 ◽

Cited By ~ 12

Author(s):

Hylke de Vries ◽

Caroline Katsman ◽

Sybren Drijfhout

Keyword(s):

Sea Level ◽

Sea Level Change ◽

Global Temperature ◽

Level Change ◽

Regional Sea Level ◽

Regional Sea Level Change

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Understanding of Contemporary Regional Sea‐Level Change and the Implications for the Future

Reviews of Geophysics ◽

10.1029/2019rg000672 ◽

2020 ◽

Vol 58 (3) ◽

Cited By ~ 1

Author(s):

Benjamin D. Hamlington ◽

Alex S. Gardner ◽

Erik Ivins ◽

Jan T. M. Lenaerts ◽

J. T. Reager ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Sea Level ◽

Sea Level Change ◽

Level Change ◽

The Future ◽

Regional Sea Level ◽

Regional Sea Level Change

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An EEMD and BP neural network hybrid approach for modeling regional sea level change

10.5004/dwt.2018.22378 ◽

2018 ◽

Vol 121 ◽

pp. 139-146

Author(s):

Lei He ◽

◽

Jilong Chen ◽

Yue Zhang ◽

Tengjiao Guo ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Neural Network ◽

Sea Level ◽

Bp Neural Network ◽

Hybrid Approach ◽

Sea Level Change ◽

Level Change ◽

Regional Sea Level ◽

Regional Sea Level Change

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The Sea Level Response to External Forcings in Historical Simulations of CMIP5 Climate Models*

Journal of Climate ◽

10.1175/jcli-d-15-0376.1 ◽

2015 ◽

Vol 28 (21) ◽

pp. 8521-8539 ◽

Cited By ~ 18

Author(s):

Aimée B. A. Slangen ◽

John A. Church ◽

Xuebin Zhang ◽

Didier P. Monselesan

Keyword(s):

Climate Variability ◽

Sea Level ◽

Regional Scale ◽

Volcanic Eruptions ◽

Sea Level Change ◽

Internal Climate Variability ◽

Level Change ◽

External Forcings ◽

Regional Sea Level ◽

Global Mean

Abstract Changes in Earth’s climate are influenced by internal climate variability and external forcings, such as changes in solar radiation, volcanic eruptions, anthropogenic greenhouse gases (GHG), and aerosols. Although the response of surface temperature to external forcings has been studied extensively, this has not been done for sea level. Here, a range of climate model experiments for the twentieth century is used to study the response of global and regional sea level change to external climate forcings. Both the global mean thermosteric sea level and the regional dynamic sea level patterns show clear responses to anthropogenic forcings that are significantly different from internal climate variability and larger than the difference between models driven by the same external forcing. The regional sea level patterns are directly related to changes in surface winds in response to the external forcings. The spread between different realizations of the same model experiment is consistent with internal climate variability derived from preindustrial control simulations. The spread between the different models is larger than the internal variability, mainly in regions with large sea level responses. Although the sea level responses to GHG and anthropogenic aerosol forcing oppose each other in the global mean, there are differences on a regional scale, offering opportunities for distinguishing between these two forcings in observed sea level change.

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