scholarly journals Vertical Deformation and Residual Altimeter Systematic Errors around Continental Australia Inferred from a Kalman-Based Approach

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mohammad-Hadi Rezvani ◽  
Christopher S. Watson ◽  
Matt A. King
Keyword(s):  
Sea Level ◽  
Systematic Errors ◽  
Time Variable ◽  
Time Variability ◽  
Surface Loading ◽  
Linear Deformation ◽  
Vertical Land Motion ◽  
Gps Velocities ◽  
Specific Error ◽  
Climate Mode

We further developed a space-time Kalman approach to estimate time-variable signals in residual altimeter systematic errors and vertical land motion (VLM) around the Australian coast since the 1990s, through combining multi-mission absolute sea-level (ASL), relative sea-level (RSL) from tide gauges (TGs) and GPS heights records. Our results confirmed continent-wide subsidence and TG-specific VLMs yielding a ~40% reduction in RMSE of geographical ASL variability, compared with rates determined using spatially interpolated GPS velocities that fail to capture localized trends by up to ~1.5 mm/yr. Stacked time series of non-linear deformation at TGs and nearby GPS showed some correlation, suggesting the technique was partially successful in reflecting the surface loading. Site-by-site inspection revealed spurious non-linearity likely caused by residual oceanographic signals present between the TG and altimeter measurement locations. Our average mission-specific error estimates are small but significant, typically within ~±0.5-1.0 mm/yr, with negligible effect implied on the overall rate of ASL. Analysis of the time variability of altimeter errors confirmed stability for most missions except for Jason-2 with an anomaly reaching ~2.8 mm/yr in the first ~3.5 years of operation which is supported by analysis from the Bass Strait altimeter validation facility. Weak correlation with the dominant climate mode suggests potential deficiencies in the resolution of the time-variable gravity field used for orbit determination as a possible cause, yet other drivers cannot be discounted. Our approach advances the ability to estimate TG-specific VLMs and regional altimeter systematic errors, and highlights that residual oceanographic signals remain a fundamental limitation to such techniques.

Validation of sea surface heights from satellite altimetry along the Indian coast

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Milaa Murshan ◽  
Balaji Devaraju ◽  
Nagarajan Balasubramanian ◽  
Onkar Dikshit
Keyword(s):  
Time Series ◽  
Sea Level ◽  
Satellite Altimetry ◽  
Tide Gauge ◽  
Atmospheric Correction ◽  
North Indian Ocean ◽  
Sea Surface ◽  
Indian Coast ◽  
Vertical Land Motion ◽  
And Performance

<p>Satellite altimetry provides measurements of sea surface height of centimeter-level accuracy over open oceans. However, its accuracy reduces when approaching the coastal areas and over land regions. Despite this downside, altimetric measurements are still applied successfully in these areas through altimeter retracking processes. This study aims to calibrate and validate retracted sea level data of Envisat, ERS-2, Topex/Poseidon, Jason-1, 2, SARAL/AltiKa, Cryosat-2 altimetric missions near the Indian coastline. We assessed the reliability, quality, and performance of these missions by comparing eight tide gauge (TG) stations along the Indian coast. These are Okha, Mumbai, Karwar, and Cochin stations in the Arabian Sea, and Nagapattinam, Chennai, Visakhapatnam, and Paradip in the Bay of Bengal. To compare the satellite altimetry and TG sea level time series, both datasets are transformed to the same reference datum. Before the calculation of the bias between the altimetry and TG sea level time series, TG data are corrected for Inverted Barometer (IB) and Dynamic Atmospheric Correction (DAC). Since there are no prior VLM measurements in our study area, VLM is calculated from TG records using the same procedure as in the Technical Report NOS organization CO-OPS 065. </p><p>Keywords— Tide gauge, Sea level, North Indian ocean, satellite altimetry, Vertical land motion</p>

scholarly journals Reanalysing glacier mass balance measurement series

2013 ◽  
Vol 7 (4) ◽  
pp. 1227-1245 ◽  
Author(s):  
M. Zemp ◽  
E. Thibert ◽  
M. Huss ◽  
D. Stumm ◽  
C. Rolstad Denby ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Data Quality ◽  
Mass Balance ◽  
Sea Level ◽  
Error Estimation ◽  
Standard Procedure ◽  
Systematic Errors ◽  
Glacier Mass Balance ◽  
Uncertainty Estimates ◽  
Measurement Series

Abstract. Glacier-wide mass balance has been measured for more than sixty years and is widely used as an indicator of climate change and to assess the glacier contribution to runoff and sea level rise. Until recently, comprehensive uncertainty assessments have rarely been carried out and mass balance data have often been applied using rough error estimation or without consideration of errors. In this study, we propose a framework for reanalysing glacier mass balance series that includes conceptual and statistical toolsets for assessment of random and systematic errors, as well as for validation and calibration (if necessary) of the glaciological with the geodetic balance results. We demonstrate the usefulness and limitations of the proposed scheme, drawing on an analysis that comprises over 50 recording periods for a dozen glaciers, and we make recommendations to investigators and users of glacier mass balance data. Reanalysing glacier mass balance series needs to become a standard procedure for every monitoring programme to improve data quality, including reliable uncertainty estimates.

scholarly journals Measuring Sea Level Rise Along the Coast

Eos ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 102 ◽  
Author(s):  
David Shultz
Keyword(s):  
Sea Level Rise ◽  
Sea Level ◽  
Solid Ground ◽  
Vertical Land Motion

Scientists created a global map of vertical land motion to show how the solid ground is moving relative to the planet’s rising seas.

Data-driven estimate of past and present surface loading over North America: Bayesian Hierarchical Modelling approach applied to GPS and GRACE observations

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Yann Ziegler ◽  
Bramha Dutt Vishwakarma ◽  
Aoibheann Brady ◽  
Stephen Chuter ◽  
Sam Royston ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
North America ◽  
Hydrological Cycle ◽  
Elastic Solid ◽  
Data Driven ◽  
Balance Model ◽  
Surface Loading ◽  
Bayesian Hierarchical ◽  
Hierarchical Modelling ◽  
Vertical Land Motion ◽  
Bayesian Hierarchical Modelling

<p>Glacial Isostatic Adjustment (GIA) and the hydrological cycle are both associated with mass changes, which are observed by GRACE, and vertical land motion (VLM), which is observed by GPS. Hydrology-related VLM results from the instantaneous response of the elastic solid Earth to surface loading by freshwater, whereas GIA-related VLM reveals the long-term response of the visco-elastic Earth mantle to past glacial cycles. Thus, observations of mass changes and VLM are interrelated and GIA and hydrology are difficult to investigate independently. Taking advantage of the differences in the spatio-temporal characteristics of the GIA and hydrology fields, we can separate the respective contributions of each process. In this work, we use a Bayesian Hierarchical Modelling (BHM) approach to provide a new data-driven estimate of GIA and time-evolving hydrology-related VLM for North America. We detail our processing strategy to prepare the input data for the BHM while preserving the content of the original observations. We discuss the separation of GIA and hydrology processes from a statistical and geophysical point of view. Finally, we assess the reliability of our estimates and compare our results to the latest GIA and hydrological models. Specifically, we compare our GIA solution to a forward-model global field, ICE-6G, and a recent GIA estimate developed for North America (Simon et al. 2017). Our time-evolving hydrology field is compared with WaterGAP, a global water balance model. Overall, for both GIA and hydrology, there is a good agreement between our results and the forward models, but we also find differences which possibly highlight deficiencies in these models.</p>

scholarly journals Sinking Tide Gauge Revealed by Space-borne InSAR: Implications for Sea Level Acceleration at Pohang, South Korea

2019 ◽  
Vol 11 (3) ◽  
pp. 277 ◽  
Author(s):  
Suresh Palanisamy Vadivel ◽  
Duk-jin Kim ◽  
Jungkyo Jung ◽  
Yang-Ki Cho ◽  
Ki-Jong Han ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Sea Level Rise ◽  
Sea Level ◽  
Tide Gauge ◽  
Tide Gauges ◽  
Tide Gauge Records ◽  
Relative Sea Level ◽  
Tide Gauge Station ◽  
Sea Level Acceleration ◽  
Vertical Land Motion ◽  
Gauge Station

Vertical land motion at tide gauges influences sea level rise acceleration; this must be addressed for interpreting reliable sea level projections. In recent years, tide gauge records for the Eastern coast of Korea have revealed rapid increases in sea level rise compared with the global mean. Pohang Tide Gauge Station has shown a +3.1 cm/year sea level rise since 2013. This study aims to estimate the vertical land motion that influences relative sea level rise observations at Pohang by applying a multi-track Persistent Scatter Interferometric Synthetic Aperture Radar (PS-InSAR) time-series analysis to Sentinel-1 SAR data acquired during 2015–2017. The results, which were obtained at a high spatial resolution (10 m), indicate vertical ground motion of −2.55 cm/year at the Pohang Tide Gauge Station; this was validated by data from a collocated global positioning system (GPS) station. The subtraction of InSAR-derived subsidence rates from sea level rise at the Pohang Tide Gauge Station is 6 mm/year; thus, vertical land motion significantly dominates the sea level acceleration. Natural hazards related to the sea level rise are primarily assessed by relative sea level changes obtained from tide gauges; therefore, tide gauge records should be reviewed for rapid vertical land motion along the vulnerable coastal areas.

scholarly journals Water level changes, subsidence, and sea level rise in the Ganges–Brahmaputra–Meghna delta

2020 ◽  
Vol 117 (4) ◽  
pp. 1867-1876 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mélanie Becker ◽  
Fabrice Papa ◽  
Mikhail Karpytchev ◽  
Caroline Delebecque ◽  
Yann Krien ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Sea Level Rise ◽  
Water Level ◽  
Sea Level ◽  
El Niño ◽  
El Nino ◽  
Southern Oscillation ◽  
Climate Mitigation ◽  
Vertical Land Motion ◽  
The Ganges ◽  
And Sea Level

Being one of the most vulnerable regions in the world, the Ganges–Brahmaputra–Meghna delta presents a major challenge for climate change adaptation of nearly 200 million inhabitants. It is often considered as a delta mostly exposed to sea-level rise and exacerbated by land subsidence, even if the local vertical land movement rates remain uncertain. Here, we reconstruct the water-level (WL) changes over 1968 to 2012, using an unprecedented set of 101 water-level gauges across the delta. Over the last 45 y, WL in the delta increased slightly faster (∼3 mm/y), than global mean sea level (∼2 mm/y). However, from 2005 onward, we observe an acceleration in the WL rise in the west of the delta. The interannual WL fluctuations are strongly modulated by El Niño Southern Oscillation (ENSO) and Indian Ocean Dipole (IOD) variability, with WL lower than average by 30 to 60 cm during co-occurrent El Niño and positive IOD events and higher-than-average WL, by 16 to 35 cm, during La Niña years. Using satellite altimetry and WL reconstructions, we estimate that the maximum expected rates of delta subsidence during 1993 to 2012 range from 1 to 7 mm/y. By 2100, even under a greenhouse gas emission mitigation scenario (Representative Concentration Pathway [RCP] 4.5), the subsidence could double the projected sea-level rise, making it reach 85 to 140 cm across the delta. This study provides a robust regional estimate of contemporary relative WL changes in the delta induced by continental freshwater dynamics, vertical land motion, and sea-level rise, giving a basis for developing climate mitigation strategies.

Global Climate Model Performance over Alaska and Greenland

2008 ◽  
Vol 21 (23) ◽  
pp. 6156-6174 ◽  
Author(s):  
John E. Walsh ◽  
William L. Chapman ◽  
Vladimir Romanovsky ◽  
Jens H. Christensen ◽  
Martin Stendel
Keyword(s):  
Sea Level ◽  
Root Mean Square ◽  
Global Climate ◽  
Systematic Errors ◽  
The Arctic ◽  
Future Climate Change ◽  
Mean Square ◽  
Sea Level Pressure ◽  
Level Pressure ◽  
Mean Square Errors

Abstract The performance of a set of 15 global climate models used in the Coupled Model Intercomparison Project is evaluated for Alaska and Greenland, and compared with the performance over broader pan-Arctic and Northern Hemisphere extratropical domains. Root-mean-square errors relative to the 1958–2000 climatology of the 40-yr ECMWF Re-Analysis (ERA-40) are summed over the seasonal cycles of three variables: surface air temperature, precipitation, and sea level pressure. The specific models that perform best over the larger domains tend to be the ones that perform best over Alaska and Greenland. The rankings of the models are largely unchanged when the bias of each model’s climatological annual mean is removed prior to the error calculation for the individual models. The annual mean biases typically account for about half of the models’ root-mean-square errors. However, the root-mean-square errors of the models are generally much larger than the biases of the composite output, indicating that the systematic errors differ considerably among the models. There is a tendency for the models with smaller errors to simulate a larger greenhouse warming over the Arctic, as well as larger increases of Arctic precipitation and decreases of Arctic sea level pressure, when greenhouse gas concentrations are increased. Because several models have substantially smaller systematic errors than the other models, the differences in greenhouse projections imply that the choice of a subset of models may offer a viable approach to narrowing the uncertainty and obtaining more robust estimates of future climate change in regions such as Alaska, Greenland, and the broader Arctic.

scholarly journals Assessing the impact of vertical land motion on twentieth century global mean sea level estimates

2016 ◽  
Vol 121 (7) ◽  
pp. 4980-4993 ◽  
Author(s):  
B. D. Hamlington ◽  
P. Thompson ◽  
W. C. Hammond ◽  
G. Blewitt ◽  
R. D. Ray
Keyword(s):  
Twentieth Century ◽  
Sea Level ◽  
Mean Sea Level ◽  
Vertical Land Motion ◽  
Global Mean Sea Level ◽  
The Impact ◽  
Global Mean

Spatio-temporal decomposition of geophysical signals in North America

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Aoibheann Brady ◽  
Jonathan Rougier ◽  
Bramha Dutt Vishwakarma ◽  
Yann Ziegler ◽  
Richard Westaway ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
North America ◽  
Sea Level Rise ◽  
Sea Level ◽  
Global Scale ◽  
Bayesian Hierarchical ◽  
Isostatic Adjustment ◽  
Modelling Framework ◽  
Vertical Land Motion ◽  
Early Results ◽  
Spatio Temporal

<p>Sea level rise is one of the most significant consequences of projected future changes in climate. One factor which influences sea level rise is vertical land motion (VLM) due to glacial isostatic adjustment (GIA), which changes the elevation of the ocean floor. Typically, GIA forward models are used for this purpose, but these are known to vary with the assumptions made about ice loading history and Earth structure. In this study, we implement a Bayesian hierarchical modelling framework to explore a data-driven VLM solution for North America, with the aim of separating out the overall signal into its GIA and hydrology (mass change) components. A Bayesian spatio-temporal model is implemented in INLA using satellite (GRACE) and in-situ (GPS) data as observations. Under the assumption that GIA varies in space but is constant in time, and that hydrology is both spatially- and temporally-variable, it is possible to separate the contributions of each component with an associated uncertainty level. Early results will be presented. Extensions to the BHM framework to investigate sea level rise at the global scale, such as the inclusion of additional processes and incorporation of increased volumes of data, will be discussed.</p>

Using subsidence scenarios to assess flood risk to delta cities under future sea level rise.

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Luke Jackson
Keyword(s):  
Ground Water ◽  
Sea Level Rise ◽  
Sea Level ◽  
Damage Model ◽  
Water Levels ◽  
Policy Intervention ◽  
Local Policy ◽  
Vertical Land Motion ◽  
Number Of Factors ◽  
Climate Crisis

<p>City level coastal subsidence can be caused by a number of factors, both natural (e.g. compaction) and anthropogenic (e.g. ground water extraction). Past observations in cities indicates that the rate of subsidence can be altered through policy intervention (e.g. Tokyo's ban on ground water pumping in 1970's). Given vertical land motion is a key component in local sea level projections where subsidence amplifies the onset of future damages, we test the extent to which intervention could reduce risk with a simple city level coastal damage model. We adjust water levels to embed different time dependent subsidence scenarios over the 21st century. We contend that local policy intervention to slow anthropogenic subsidence where possible will slow the onset of damaging sea level rise thus reducing potential coastal damages, and reduce the required increases in future flood protection heights. Performed in tandem with global mitigation efforts, cities currently under major threat may yet survive the climate crisis.</p>

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