Spatial variability of sea level rise due to water impoundment behind dams

Fiedler, Julia W.; Conrad, Clinton P.

doi:10.1029/2010gl043462

Cited by 36 publications

(39 citation statements)

References 28 publications

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“…Other contributions we do not consider here are variations in terrestrial water storage, such as water impoundment behind dams (Fiedler and Conrad 2010) or groundwater mining (Wada et al 2010). Fiedler and Conrad (2010) report a global average RSL drop of approximately 30 mm over the twentieth century, while Wada et al (2010) find an average RSL rise of 0.8 mm/year due to groundwater mining.…”

Section: Discussion Of Contributions Not Included In This Studymentioning

confidence: 99%

Towards regional projections of twenty-first century sea-level change based on IPCC SRES scenarios

et al. 2011

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Sea-level change is often considered to be globally uniform in sea-level projections. However, local relative sea-level (RSL) change can deviate substantially from the global mean. Here, we present maps of twenty-first century local RSL change estimates based on an ensemble of coupled climate model simulations for three emission scenarios. In the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change Fourth Assessment Report (IPCC AR4), the same model simulations were used for their projections of global mean sea-level rise. The contribution of the small glaciers and ice caps to local RSL change is calculated with a glacier model, based on a volume-area approach. The contributions of the Greenland and Antarctic ice sheets are obtained from IPCC AR4 estimates. The RSL distribution resulting from the land ice mass changes is then calculated by solving the sea-level equation for a rotating, elastic Earth model. Next, we add the pattern of steric RSL changes obtained from the coupled climate models and a model estimate for the effect of Glacial Isostatic Adjustment. The resulting ensemble mean RSL pattern reveals that many regions will experience RSL changes that differ substantially from the global mean. For the A1B ensemble, local RSL change values range from -3.91 to 0.79 m, with a global mean of 0.47 m. Although the RSL amplitude differs, the spatial patterns are similar for all three emission scenarios. The spread in the projections is dominated by the distribution of the steric contribution, at least for the processes included in this study. Extreme ice loss scenarios may alter this picture. For individual sites, we find a standard deviation for the combined contributions of approximately 10 cm, regardless of emission scenario.

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Section: Discussion Of Contributions Not Included In This Studymentioning

confidence: 99%

Towards regional projections of twenty-first century sea-level change based on IPCC SRES scenarios

et al. 2011

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“…Douglas 1991) and some studies attempted to detect an acceleration in the local rate of sea-level rise (Woodworth 1990;Woodworth et al 2009;Douglas 1992). However, these individual records have considerable interannual and decadal variability and thus long records are required to get accurate estimates of the local trends in sea level (Douglas 2001). These authors assumed that these long-term trends are either representative of the global averaged rise or a number of records have been averaged, in some cases regionally and then globally, to estimate the global average rate of rise.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Sea-Level Rise from the Late 19th to the Early 21st Century

Church¹,

White²

2011

The Earth's Cryosphere and Sea Level Change

330

496

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We estimate the rise in global average sea level from satellite altimeter data for 1993-2009 and from coastal and island sea-level measurements from 1880 to 2009 . For 1993-2009 and after correcting for glacial isostatic adjustment, the estimated rate of rise is 3.2 ± 0.4 mm year -1 from the satellite data and 2.8 ± 0.8 mm year -1 from the in situ data. The global average sea-level rise from 1880 to 2009 is about 210 mm. The linear trend from 1900 to 2009 is 1.7 ± 0.2 mm year -1 and since 1961 is 1.9 ± 0.4 mm year -1 . There is considerable variability in the rate of rise during the twentieth century but there has been a statistically significant acceleration since 1880 and 1900 of 0.009 ± 0.003 mm year -2 and 0.009 ± 0.004 mm year -2 , respectively. Since the start of the altimeter record in 1993, global average sea level rose at a rate near the upper end of the sea level projections of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change's Third and Fourth Assessment Reports. However, the reconstruction indicates there was little net change in sea level from 1990 to 1993, most likely as a result of the volcanic eruption of Mount Pinatubo in 1991.

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“…1B) before ∼1970 are the result of methodological limitations with respect to the heterogeneous spatial and temporal tide gauge distribution, we test our approach in a set of 12 synthetic sea level fields from the Simple Ocean Data Assimilation (SODA) reanalysis and historical simulations of CMIP5 models during their common period from 1871 to 2005; these are combined with the corresponding components of the glacier contribution (in the case of SODA, the glacier reconstruction from ref. 18) and historical fingerprints from TWS (21,22) and the Antarctic and Greenland ice sheets (19,20) (Materials and Methods). Because in the synthetic sea level fields the true model GMSL, as well as the individual ice-melt and TWS fingerprints, are a priori known, they are an excellent testbed for our reconstruction approach.…”

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confidence: 99%

“…After accounting for VLM, each tide gauge is further corrected for geoid changes from ongoing GIA (17), glacier/ice-sheet melting (18)(19)(20) (Fig. S2 C and D), and TWS (21,22) (Fig. S2B).…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

Reassessment of 20th century global mean sea level rise

Dangendorf

Marcos

Wöppelmann

et al. 2017

Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A.

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315

237

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The rate at which global mean sea level (GMSL) rose during the 20th century is uncertain, with little consensus between various reconstructions that indicate rates of rise ranging from 1.3 to 2 mm·y −1 . Here we present a 20th-century GMSL reconstruction computed using an area-weighting technique for averaging tide gauge records that both incorporates up-to-date observations of vertical land motion (VLM) and corrections for local geoid changes resulting from ice melting and terrestrial freshwater storage and allows for the identification of possible differences compared with earlier attempts. Our reconstructed GMSL trend of 1.1 ± 0.3 mm·y −1 (1σ) before 1990 falls below previous estimates, whereas our estimate of 3.1 ± 1.4 mm·y −1 from 1993 to 2012 is consistent with independent estimates from satellite altimetry, leading to overall acceleration larger than previously suggested. This feature is geographically dominated by the Indian Ocean-Southern Pacific region, marking a transition from lower-than-average rates before 1990 toward unprecedented high rates in recent decades. We demonstrate that VLM corrections, area weighting, and our use of a common reference datum for tide gauges may explain the lower rates compared with earlier GMSL estimates in approximately equal proportion. The trends and multidecadal variability of our GMSL curve also compare well to the sum of individual

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Spatial variability of sea level rise due to water impoundment behind dams

Cited by 36 publications

References 28 publications

Towards regional projections of twenty-first century sea-level change based on IPCC SRES scenarios

Towards regional projections of twenty-first century sea-level change based on IPCC SRES scenarios

Sea-Level Rise from the Late 19th to the Early 21st Century

Reassessment of 20th century global mean sea level rise

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