Australian sea levels—Trends, regional variability and influencing factors

White, Neil J.; Haigh, Ivan D.; Church, John A.; Koen, Terry; Watson, Christopher; Pritchard, Tim; Watson, Phil J.; Burgette, Reed J.; McInnes, Kathleen L.; You, Zai-Jin; Zhang, Xuebin; Tregoning, Paul

doi:10.1016/j.earscirev.2014.05.011

Cited by 123 publications

(128 citation statements)

References 76 publications

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“…9a). In the case of Darwin it could be due to an underestimate of the subsidence in the ULR6 GPS solution [estimates by White et al (2014) indicate a subsidence 0.9 mm yr 21 larger than ULR6]. Figure 6 shows that the observed variations in Fremantle andDunedin between 1930 and1975 are well captured by the climate model ensemble mean.…”

Section: ) In Australia and New Zealandmentioning

confidence: 55%

Evaluating Model Simulations of Twentieth-Century Sea-Level Rise. Part II: Regional Sea-Level Changes

et al. 2017

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Twentieth-century regional sea level changes are estimated from 12 climate models from phase 5 of the Climate Model Intercomparison Project (CMIP5). The output of the CMIP5 climate model simulations was used to calculate the global and regional sea level changes associated with dynamic sea level, atmospheric loading, glacier mass changes, and ice sheet surface mass balance contributions. The contribution from groundwater depletion, reservoir storage, and dynamic ice sheet mass changes are estimated from observations as they are not simulated by climate models. All contributions are summed, including the glacial isostatic adjustment (GIA) contribution, and compared to observational estimates from 27 tide gauge records over the twentieth century . A general agreement is found between the simulated sea level and tide gauge records in terms of interannual to multidecadal variability over 1900-2015. But climate models tend to systematically underestimate the observed sea level trends, particularly in the first half of the twentieth century. The corrections based on attributable biases between observations and models that have been identified in Part I of this two-part paper result in an improved explanation of the spatial variability in observed sea level trends by climate models. Climate models show that the spatial variability in sea level trends observed by tide gauge records is dominated by the GIA contribution and the steric contribution over 1900-2015. Climate models also show that it is important to include all contributions to sea level changes as they cause significant local deviations; note, for example, the groundwater depletion around India, which is responsible for the low twentieth-century sea level rise in the region.

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Section: ) In Australia and New Zealandmentioning

confidence: 55%

Evaluating Model Simulations of Twentieth-Century Sea-Level Rise. Part II: Regional Sea-Level Changes

et al. 2017

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“…Over the East Coast region, warm and cool eddies from the East Australian Current can also contribute to local sea level changes of about 0.2 m (McInnes et al, 2012b). As discussed in section 2, ENSO can strongly influence background sea levels in northern Australia (White et al, 2014). …”

Section: Figurementioning

confidence: 99%

“…We build upon both the recent IPCC assessments (Church et al, 2013b, Wong et al 2014) and also recent assessments of sea levels in Australia (White et al 2014). This allows us to provide an overall assessment of observed 20 th century and projected 21 st century sea levels.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…These assessments did not consider tectonic factors that affect local sea level. Following these advances, it is timely to consider the implications of the improvements in these global assessments for Australia.The specific goals of the paper are to: provide regionally specific and credible relative SLR (sea level relative to the land) projections around Australia for the 21 st century,  review recent studies on extreme sea levels, their causes and projections, and  provide a means for interpreting SLR projections, uncertainty and extremes by the use of sea-level "allowances".We build upon both the recent IPCC assessments (Church et al, 2013b, Wong et al 2014) and also recent assessments of sea levels in Australia (White et al 2014). This allows us to provide an overall assessment of observed 20 th century and projected 21 st century sea levels.…”

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confidence: 99%

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Information for Australian impact and adaptation planning in response to sea-level rise

McInnes¹,

Church²,

Monselesan³

et al. 2015

AMOJ

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Sea levels along Australia's coastline are influenced by natural climate variability and anthropogenic climate change. Projections of sea-level rise (SLR) for 2090 for the Australian coastline are similar to the global mean sea-level projections. The global and regional projections are almost independent of the Representative Concentration Pathways (RCPs) for greenhouse gas emissions chosen for the first decades of the 21 st century, but they begin to diverge significantly from about 2050. For the business-as-usual scenario (RCP8.5), the rates increase steadily through the 21 st century, reaching almost 12 mm yr -1 by 2100 at all locations. For the intermediate scenarios of RCP 6.0 and RCP 4.5, the rates stabilise in about 2090 and 2060 at about 7-8 and 6 mm yr -1 , respectively. For the strong mitigation scenario (RCP 2.6, requiring significant and urgent mitigation of greenhouse gas emissions), the rate of rise stabilises much earlier than the other scenarios and then reduces slightly to about 4 mm yr -1 . On the north and west coasts of Australia, the observed sea-level trends from the start of the projections in 1996 to 2010 are larger than the model projections as a result of the combined effect of SLR and internal modes of climate variability.The impacts of SLR will be felt most profoundly during extreme sea-level events. The meteorological and climate processes that contribute to extreme sea levels around the coast of Australia are highly regionally heterogeneous. Allowances were calculated that provide estimates of the height that present assets or their protective measures would need to be raised to ensure that the likelihood of exceedance of those levels in the future does not change from the present climate. These allowances vary according to SLR projections, their uncertainties and the variability of extreme sea levels. For 2030, when the uncertainty surrounding future SLR scenarios is small, the allowances are approximately the median projected SLR. However by 2090, the larger uncertainties associated with the projections lead to allowances that typically lie towards the upper end of the range of projected SLR. IntroductionSea-level rise (SLR) is a significant concern for Australia with about half the population living within 7 km of the coast (Chen and McAneney, 2006) and a significant amount of industry and infrastructure located in the coastal zone. Between 22 and 35% of residential dwellings in Australia have been identified as potentially exposed to flooding under a SLR scenario of 1.1 metres (Department of Climate Change, 2009 Coastal infrastructure and coastal ecosystems are most at risk during extreme sea-level events, caused by storm surges and other contributing factors such as astronomical tides. It is therefore of vital importance that credible and robust up-to-date information on SLR projections and the impacts on extreme events are available for coastal planning and adaptation.The Intergovernmental Panel for Climate Change (IPCC) assessments are a major source of SLR information, with ...

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“…We differenced monthly RLR MSL records from the PSMSL [Holgate et al, 2013] and monthly altimeter means produced by CSIRO [White et al, 2014], then computed piecewise linear VLM trends using the above modified form of CATS. Piecewise linear rates plus annual and semiannual signals were estimated for all…”

Section: Differential Rlr and Altimetrymentioning

confidence: 99%

Nonlinear subsidence at Fremantle, a long‐recording tide gauge in the Southern Hemisphere

et al. 2015

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A combination of independent evidence (continuous GPS, repeat geodetic leveling, groundwater abstraction, satellite altimetry, and tide gauge (TG) records) shows that the long‐recording Fremantle TG has been subsiding in a nonlinear way since the mid‐1970s due to time‐variable groundwater abstraction. The vertical land motion (VLM) rates vary from approximately −2 to −4 mm/yr (i.e., subsidence), thus producing a small apparent acceleration in mean sea level computed from the Fremantle TG records. We exemplify that GPS‐derived VLM must be geodetically connected to the TG to eliminate the commonly used assumption that there is no differential VLM when the GPS is not colocated with the TG. In the Perth Basin, we show that groundwater abstraction can be used as a diagnostic tool for identifying nonlinear VLM that is not evident in GPS time series alone.

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Australian sea levels—Trends, regional variability and influencing factors

Cited by 123 publications

References 76 publications

Evaluating Model Simulations of Twentieth-Century Sea-Level Rise. Part II: Regional Sea-Level Changes

Evaluating Model Simulations of Twentieth-Century Sea-Level Rise. Part II: Regional Sea-Level Changes

Information for Australian impact and adaptation planning in response to sea-level rise

Nonlinear subsidence at Fremantle, a long‐recording tide gauge in the Southern Hemisphere

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