Predicting Sea-Level Rise in Al Hamra Development, Ras Al Khaimah, UAE

The Al Hamra development in the emirate of Ras Al Khaimah is situated along the south-eastern coast of the Arabian Gulf. The development fronts the Gulf along a 5 km. stretch of sandy beach and, as it includes 5 hotels, numerous villas and condos, represents a significant investment. Such an investment requires long-term strategies to minimize risk from sea level rise. As IPCC reports continue to be updated with new information, predictions of sea level rise have been revised upward. In order to plan for the protection of these, and other developments, accurate information needs to be supplied to those involved in planning adaptation strategies. This paper seeks to quantify and map the potential area subject to inundation up to the year 2099. Using the highest inundation scenario, a GIS map of inundation will be created. Other factors, such as high tides, storm surge and extreme wave events will see water levels increased beyond the predicted sea level scenarios indicating greater risk of flooding. This project will use LiDAR data in a GIS environment to provide the most accurate elevation data. Other layers showing buildings assist in visualizing future vulnerability to sea level rise. This coastline is heavily developed with construction underway for more resort developments. As the risk from sea level rise evolves over a long time period, planners require accurate information that can be easily updated in order to react to revised predictions. This paper represents a pilot project as future research is planned to examine the entire 65km coastline of Ras Al Khaimah

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High accuracy coastal flood mapping for Norway using LiDAR data

10.5194/nhess-2019-217 ◽

2019 ◽

Cited By ~ 1

Author(s):

Kristian Breili ◽

Matthew James Ross Simpson ◽

Erlend Klokkervold ◽

Oda Roaldsdotter Ravndal

Keyword(s):

At Risk ◽

Sea Level Rise ◽

Sea Level ◽

Storm Surge ◽

Coastal Flooding ◽

High Accuracy ◽

Mapping Method ◽

Water Levels ◽

Climate Services ◽

Elevation Data

Abstract. Using new high accuracy Light Detection and Ranging elevation data we generate coastal flooding maps for Norway. Thus far, we have mapped ~ 80 % of the coast, for which we currently have data of sufficient accuracy to perform our analysis. Although Norway is generally at low risk from sea-level rise largely owing to its steep topography, the maps presented here show that on local scales, many parts of the coast are potentially vulnerable to flooding. There is a considerable amount of infrastructure at risk along the relatively long and complicated coastline. Nationwide we identify a total area of 400 km2, 105,000 buildings, and 510 km of roads that are at risk of flooding from a 200 year storm-surge event at present. These numbers will increase to 610 km2, 137,000, and 1340 km with projected sea-level rise to 2090 (95th percentile of RCP8.5 as recommended in planning). We find that some of our results are likely biased high owing to erroneous mapping (at least for lower water levels close to the tidal datum which delineates the coastline). A comparison of control points from different terrain types indicates that the elevation model has a root mean square error of 0.26 m and is the largest source of uncertainty in our mapping method. The coastal flooding maps and associated statistics are freely available, and alongside the development of coastal climate services, will help communicate the risks of sea-level rise and storm surge to stakeholders. This will in turn aid coastal management and climate adaption work in Norway.

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New elevation data triple estimates of global vulnerability to sea-level rise and coastal flooding

Nature Communications ◽

10.1038/s41467-019-12808-z ◽

2019 ◽

Vol 10 (1) ◽

Cited By ~ 70

Author(s):

Scott A. Kulp ◽

Benjamin H. Strauss

Keyword(s):

Sea Level Rise ◽

Sea Level ◽

High Tide ◽

Water Levels ◽

Low Carbon ◽

Digital Elevation ◽

Elevation Data ◽

Global Mean Sea Level ◽

Elevation Model ◽

Global Mean

Abstract Most estimates of global mean sea-level rise this century fall below 2 m. This quantity is comparable to the positive vertical bias of the principle digital elevation model (DEM) used to assess global and national population exposures to extreme coastal water levels, NASA’s SRTM. CoastalDEM is a new DEM utilizing neural networks to reduce SRTM error. Here we show – employing CoastalDEM—that 190 M people (150–250 M, 90% CI) currently occupy global land below projected high tide lines for 2100 under low carbon emissions, up from 110 M today, for a median increase of 80 M. These figures triple SRTM-based values. Under high emissions, CoastalDEM indicates up to 630 M people live on land below projected annual flood levels for 2100, and up to 340 M for mid-century, versus roughly 250 M at present. We estimate one billion people now occupy land less than 10 m above current high tide lines, including 230 M below 1 m.

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Predicting the Extent of Inundation due to Sea-Level Rise: Al Hamra Development, Ras Al Khaimah, UAE. A Pilot Project

Miscellanea Geographica ◽

10.1515/mgrsd-2016-0012 ◽

2016 ◽

Vol 20 (2) ◽

pp. 25-31 ◽

Cited By ~ 1

Author(s):

Robert M. Arthur ◽

G. G. Garland

Keyword(s):

Sea Level Rise ◽

Sea Level ◽

Arabian Gulf ◽

Pilot Project ◽

Coastal Areas ◽

Worst Case ◽

Physical Relationship ◽

Sea Levels ◽

Land Owners ◽

New Information

Abstract As new information is received, predictions of sea-level rise resulting from global warming continue to be revised upwards. Measurements indicate that the rise in sea-level is continuing at, or close to, the worst case forecasts (Kellet et al. 2014). Coastal areas are coming under increasing risk of inundation and flooding as storms are predicted to increase in frequency and severity, adding to the risk of inundation due to higher sea levels. Stakeholders, government agencies, developers and land owners require accurate, up to date information to be able to protect coastal areas. Geographic Information Systems (GIS) along with accurate remote sensing technologies such as LiDAR provides the best means for delivering this information. Using these technologies, this paper predicts the risk posed to a large multi-use development in the emirate of Ras Al Khaimah, UAE. This development, Al Hamra Village, is situated on the coast of the Arabian Gulf. Al Hamra’s physical relationship to the Gulf is in common with other developments in Ras Al Khaimah in its and for this reason has been used as a pilot project. The resulting GIS model shows that Al Hamra is indeed at risk from predicted flood events. How this information can be used as a planning tool for numerous strategies is discussed in this paper.

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Estimating the Annual Exceedance Probability of Water Levels and Wave Heights from High Resolution Coupled Wave-Circulation Models in Long Island Sound

Journal of Marine Science and Engineering ◽

10.3390/jmse8070475 ◽

2020 ◽

Vol 8 (7) ◽

pp. 475

Author(s):

Chang Liu ◽

Yan Jia ◽

Yaprak Onat ◽

Alejandro Cifuentes-Lorenzen ◽

Amin Ilia ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Sea Level Rise ◽

Sea Level ◽

Long Island ◽

Long Island Sound ◽

Water Levels ◽

Eastern Coast ◽

Significant Wave ◽

Wave Heights ◽

Significant Wave Heights ◽

Island Sound

Accurately estimating the probability of storm surge occurrences is necessary for flood risk assessments. This research models Long Island Sound using a coupled coastal circulation and wave model (FVCOM-SWAVE) to hindcast the 44 highest storms between 1950–2018 and fitted Poisson-GPD distributions to modelled water levels and wave heights. Floodwater elevations and significant wave heights for 10% (1/10), 3% (1/30), 2% (1/50), and 1% (1/100) annual exceedance probabilities are provided for all Connecticut coastal towns. The results show that both water levels and their corresponding return intervals are higher along the western coast of Connecticut than the eastern coast, whereas significant wave heights increase eastward. Comparing our model results with those from the North Atlantic Coast Comprehensive Study (NACCS) shows that the mean NACCS results are higher for water levels and lower for significant wave heights for longer return periods. Likewise, the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) results in large errors compared to our results in both eastern and western coastal Connecticut regions. In addition to evaluating historical risks, we also added a sea-level height offset of 0.5 m for 2050 estimates in order to examine the effect of rising sea-levels on the analysis. We find that sea-level rise reduces the return period of a 10-year storm to two years. We advise periodically updating this work as improved sea-level rise projections become available.

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Economic damages from Hurricane Sandy attributable to sea level rise caused by anthropogenic climate change

Nature Communications ◽

10.1038/s41467-021-22838-1 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 12 (1) ◽

Author(s):

Benjamin H. Strauss ◽

Philip M. Orton ◽

Klaus Bittermann ◽

Maya K. Buchanan ◽

Daniel M. Gilford ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Climate Change ◽

Sea Level Rise ◽

Sea Level ◽

East Coast ◽

The United States ◽

Hurricane Sandy ◽

Water Levels ◽

Anthropogenic Climate Change ◽

Economic Damage ◽

Sea Levels

AbstractIn 2012, Hurricane Sandy hit the East Coast of the United States, creating widespread coastal flooding and over $60 billion in reported economic damage. The potential influence of climate change on the storm itself has been debated, but sea level rise driven by anthropogenic climate change more clearly contributed to damages. To quantify this effect, here we simulate water levels and damage both as they occurred and as they would have occurred across a range of lower sea levels corresponding to different estimates of attributable sea level rise. We find that approximately $8.1B ($4.7B–$14.0B, 5th–95th percentiles) of Sandy’s damages are attributable to climate-mediated anthropogenic sea level rise, as is extension of the flood area to affect 71 (40–131) thousand additional people. The same general approach demonstrated here may be applied to impact assessments for other past and future coastal storms.

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Global LiDAR land elevation data reveal greatest sea-level rise vulnerability in the tropics

Nature Communications ◽

10.1038/s41467-021-23810-9 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 12 (1) ◽

Author(s):

A. Hooijer ◽

R. Vernimmen

Keyword(s):

Sea Level Rise ◽

Sea Level ◽

Flood Risk ◽

Land Area ◽

Area At Risk ◽

Population Number ◽

Coastal Flood ◽

Elevation Data ◽

Coastal Flood Risk ◽

The Tropics

AbstractCoastal flood risk assessments require accurate land elevation data. Those to date existed only for limited parts of the world, which has resulted in high uncertainty in projections of land area at risk of sea-level rise (SLR). Here we have applied the first global elevation model derived from satellite LiDAR data. We find that of the worldwide land area less than 2 m above mean sea level, that is most vulnerable to SLR, 649,000 km2 or 62% is in the tropics. Even assuming a low-end relative SLR of 1 m by 2100 and a stable lowland population number and distribution, the 2020 population of 267 million on such land would increase to at least 410 million of which 72% in the tropics and 59% in tropical Asia alone. We conclude that the burden of current coastal flood risk and future SLR falls disproportionally on tropical regions, especially in Asia.

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Quantifying Uncertainty in Exposure to Coastal Hazards Associated with Both Climate Change and Adaptation Strategies: A U.S. Pacific Northwest Alternative Coastal Futures Analysis

Water ◽

10.3390/w13040545 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 13 (4) ◽

pp. 545

Author(s):

Alexis K. Mills ◽

Peter Ruggiero ◽

John P. Bolte ◽

Katherine A. Serafin ◽

Eva Lipiec

Keyword(s):

Climate Change ◽

Sea Level Rise ◽

Sea Level ◽

Performance Metrics ◽

Coastal Flooding ◽

Water Levels ◽

Coastal Hazards ◽

Policy Decisions ◽

Management Decisions ◽

Quantifying Uncertainty

Coastal communities face heightened risk to coastal flooding and erosion hazards due to sea-level rise, changing storminess patterns, and evolving human development pressures. Incorporating uncertainty associated with both climate change and the range of possible adaptation measures is essential for projecting the evolving exposure to coastal flooding and erosion, as well as associated community vulnerability through time. A spatially explicit agent-based modeling platform, that provides a scenario-based framework for examining interactions between human and natural systems across a landscape, was used in Tillamook County, OR (USA) to explore strategies that may reduce exposure to coastal hazards within the context of climate change. Probabilistic simulations of extreme water levels were used to assess the impacts of variable projections of sea-level rise and storminess both as individual climate drivers and under a range of integrated climate change scenarios through the end of the century. Additionally, policy drivers, modeled both as individual management decisions and as policies integrated within adaptation scenarios, captured variability in possible human response to increased hazards risk. The relative contribution of variability and uncertainty from both climate change and policy decisions was quantified using three stakeholder relevant landscape performance metrics related to flooding, erosion, and recreational beach accessibility. In general, policy decisions introduced greater variability and uncertainty to the impacts of coastal hazards than climate change uncertainty. Quantifying uncertainty across a suite of coproduced performance metrics can help determine the relative impact of management decisions on the adaptive capacity of communities under future climate scenarios.

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Modelling the climate change impact on the largest White Sea estuarine areas

10.5194/egusphere-egu21-8274 ◽

2021 ◽

Author(s):

Evgeniya Panchenko ◽

Andrei Alabyan ◽

Inna Krylenko ◽

Serafima Lebedeva

Keyword(s):

Climate Change ◽

Sea Level Rise ◽

Sea Level ◽

River Runoff ◽

White Sea ◽

Water Levels ◽

Hydrodynamic Modelling ◽

The White Sea ◽

Runoff Changes ◽

Flow Velocities

Possible sea level rise and changes in hydrological regime of rivers are the major threats to estuarine systems. The sensibility of hydrodynamic regime of the Northern Dvina delta and the Onega estuary under various scenarios of climate change has been investigated. Hydrodynamic models HEC-RAS (USA, US Army Corps of Engineers Hydrologic Engineering Center) and STREAM_2D (Russia, authors V.Belikov et.al.) were used for analysis of estuarine flow regime (variations of water levels, discharges and flow velocities throughout tidal cycles). Input runoff changes were simulated for different climate scenarios using ECOMAG model (Russia, author Yu.Motovilov) based on data of global climate models (GSM) of CMIP5 project for the White Sea region.ECOMAG modelling has demonstrated that the maximum river discharges averaged for 30-year period 2036 &#8211; 2065 can reduce for about 20 &#8211; 27% for the Onega and 15 &#8211; 20% for the Northern Dvina river compared against the historical period 1971 &#8211; 2000.Averaged minimum river discharges can reduce for about 33 &#8211; 45% for the Onega and 30 &#8211; 40% for the Northern Dvina.The White Sea level rise by 0.27 m in average (with inter-model variation from 0.20 to 0.38 m) can took place by the middle of the XXI century according to input data of GSM models. The 12 scenarios of estuarine hydrodynamic changes were simulated for the both rivers based on combining river runoff changes and sea level elevation.In general, the expected flow changes are negative for the local industry and population. According to modelling results for &#8216;high runoff/spring tide&#8217; scenarios the flooding area in the Northern Dvina delta will increase by 13-20% depending on the intensity of sea level rise. In the low water seasons the distance from the river mouth to the upper boundary of the reach, where reverse currents can be observed, will move upstream by 8 - 36 km depending of sea/river conditions due to decrease in minimum river runoff. It may adversely effect on shipping conditions at the city of Arkhangelsk and on brackish water intrusion up-to industrial and communal water intakes.The reverse currents also will intensify in the Onega estuary (tidal flow velocities increase for 11 &#8211; 19%) that leads to the change of the sediment regime and can significantly deteriorate the navigation conditions at the seaport of the Onega town. The problem of the intensification of salt intrusion can arise there as well.The research was supported by the Russian Foundation for Basic Research (Projects No. 18- 05-60021 in development of the scenarios; No. 19-35-90032 in providing hydrodynamic modelling of the Onega; Project No. 19-35-60032 in providing hydrodynamic modelling of the Northern Dvina).

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A 6000-year record of ecological and hydrological changes from Laguna de la Leche, north coastal Cuba

Quaternary Research ◽

10.1016/j.yqres.2006.08.004 ◽

2007 ◽

Vol 67 (1) ◽

pp. 69-82 ◽

Cited By ~ 28

Author(s):

Matthew C. Peros ◽

Eduard G. Reinhardt ◽

Anthony M. Davis

Keyword(s):

Sea Level Rise ◽

Sea Level ◽

Plant Macrofossils ◽

Water Levels ◽

Loss On Ignition ◽

Coastal Lake ◽

Freshwater Gastropods ◽

Level Increase ◽

Pollen Rain ◽

Calcareous Microfossils

AbstractLaguna de la Leche, north coastal Cuba, is a shallow (≤ 3 m), oligohaline (∼ 2.0–4.5‰) coastal lake surrounded by mangroves and cattail stands. A 227-cm core was studied using loss-on-ignition, pollen, calcareous microfossils, and plant macrofossils. From ∼6200 to ∼ 4800 cal yr BP, the area was an oligohaline lake. The period from ∼ 4800 to ∼ 4200 cal yr BP saw higher water levels and a freshened system; these changes are indicated by an increase in the regional pollen rain, as well as by the presence of charophyte oogonia and an increase in freshwater gastropods (Hydrobiidae). By ∼ 4000 cal yr BP, an open mesohaline lagoon had formed; an increase in salt-tolerant foraminifers suggests that water level increase was driven by relative sea level rise. The initiation of Laguna de la Leche correlates with a shift to wetter conditions as indicated in pollen records from the southeastern United States (e.g., Lake Tulane). This synchronicity suggests that sea level rise caused middle Holocene environmental change region-wide. Two other cores sampled from mangrove swamps in the vicinity of Laguna de la Leche indicate that a major expansion of mangroves was underway by ∼ 1700 cal yr BP.

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Determining Extreme Still Water Levels for Design and Planning Purposes Incorporating Sea Level Rise: Sydney, Australia

Atmosphere ◽

10.3390/atmos13010095 ◽

2022 ◽

Vol 13 (1) ◽

pp. 95

Author(s):

Phil J. Watson

Keyword(s):

Sea Level Rise ◽

Water Level ◽

Sea Level ◽

Tide Gauge ◽

Water Levels ◽

Extreme Value Analysis ◽

Tide Gauge Record ◽

Value Analysis ◽

Mean Sea Level ◽

The Impact

This paper provides an Extreme Value Analysis (EVA) of the hourly water level record at Fort Denison dating back to 1915 to understand the statistical likelihood of the combination of high predicted tides and the more dynamic influences that can drive ocean water levels higher at the coast. The analysis is based on the Peaks-Over-Threshold (POT) method using a fitted Generalised Pareto Distribution (GPD) function to estimate extreme hourly heights above mean sea level. The analysis highlights the impact of the 1974 East Coast Low event and rarity of the associated measured water level above mean sea level at Sydney, with an estimated return period exceeding 1000 years. Extreme hourly predictions are integrated with future projections of sea level rise to provide estimates of relevant still water levels at 2050, 2070 and 2100 for a range of return periods (1 to 1000 years) for use in coastal zone management, design, and sea level rise adaptation planning along the NSW coastline. The analytical procedures described provide a step-by-step guide for practitioners on how to develop similar baseline information from any long tide gauge record and the associated limitations and key sensitivities that must be understood and appreciated in applying EVA.

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