The many faces of anthropogenic subsidence

Abstract

Shallow and deep human subsurface activities contribute to the total subsidence

Assessing land elevation in the Ayeyarwady Delta (Myanmar) and its relevance for studying sea level rise and delta flooding

“…Furthermore, subsidence will increase the impact of SLR, lowering elevation locally by up to ~2.70 m until 2150 if continuing at rates of 10-20 mm yr -1 as observed for Yangon City (van der Horst et al, 2018). However, subsidence rates, especially in deltaic settings, are caused by many different processes that can be highly spatio-temporal variable (Shirzaei et al, 2021) and increased human activities are known to accelerate rates (Minderhoud et al, 2017;Candela and Koster, 2022), hampering reliable long term estimations. Therefore, we highlight that the IPCC SLR scenariosalthough projected for 2100 and 2150, respectivelycould be realised much sooner, and land elevation thus becomes even more critical.…”

Data, knowledge, and modeling challenges for science-informed management of river deltas

“…Many of those unique landforms could disappear below rising sea levels by the end of the century, drowning not only ecosystems but also critical areas for food supply 1,2 and human livelihoods [3][4][5] . The great risk faced by deltas is documented by increasingly urgent calls for action by the global scientific community [6][7][8][9][10] over the last few years. Averting potentially disastrous environmental degradation in river deltas will require decisive action across scales and sectors.…”

“…Deltas are geologically young, depositional landforms that, by nature, experience land subsidence as their unconsolidated sediments compact over time 18 . Anthropic activities , e.g., the extraction of underground resources, drainage of shallow soils, and artificial loading further accelerate land subsidence 6,19,20 . Together, those drivers across scales lead to rapid rates of relative sea level rise (rSLR), which denotes a lowering of the land surface compared to rising sea levels 21 and thus a greater risk of land falling below the ocean surface than from either sea level rise or accelerated subsidence alone.…”

“…Those tasks need both reliable data as well as predictive capacities. There have been detailed reviews of global patterns 3,6,20,26,[32][33][34][35] , monitoring techniques 36 , and numerical models [37][38][39] for specific drivers, and indepth reviews of the multiple drivers behind rSLR in specific deltas 1,24,[40][41][42] . Yet, what is missing is a global review to understand key knowledge gaps towards developing an integrated understanding of drivers behind rSLR across scales.…”

Novel Integration of Geodetic and Geologic Methods for High‐Resolution Monitoring of Subsidence in the Mississippi Delta

“…Despite numerous recent efforts to better understand the processes that contribute to coastal subsidence, progress has been hindered by the fact that different measurement techniques sometimes produce seemingly conflicting results (e.g., Brown & Nicholls, 2015; Frederick et al., 2019; Steckler et al., 2022), presenting an obstacle to disentangling subsidence drivers. For example, even separating the effect of anthropogenic processes (e.g., groundwater vs. hydrocarbon extraction) may be challenging (Candela & Koster, 2022). To alleviate these problems, multidisciplinary approaches by larger research teams are needed (e.g., Allison et al., 2016; Shirzaei et al., 2021).…”