Projecting twenty-first century regional sea-level changes using CMIP5 — ASN Events
  1. Schedule
  2. Climate modelling and projections
  3. Projecting twenty-first century regional sea-level changes using CMIP5

Projecting twenty-first century regional sea-level changes using CMIP5 (7780)

Aimée Slangen 1 2 , Mark Carson 3 , Caroline Katsman 4 , Roderik van de Wal 2 , Armin Kohl 3 , Bert Vermeersen 5 6 , Detlef Stammer 3
  1. CMAR, CSIRO, Hobart, Tas, Australia
  2. Institute for Marine and Atmospheric research Utrecht, Utrecht, The Netherlands
  3. Center for Earth System Research and Sustainability, Hamburg, Germany
  4. Royal Netherlands Meteorological Institute, De Bilt, The Netherlands
  5. Delft Climate Institute, Faculty of Aerospace Engineering, Delft, The Netherlands
  6. Royal Netherlands Institute for Sea Research, 't Horntje, The Netherlands

We present regional sea-level projections and associated uncertainty estimates for the end of the twenty-first century, based on CMIP5 climate model projections. These projections include gravitational effects due to land ice mass changes and groundwater extraction, as well as regional changes in ocean density and circulation, atmospheric pressure loading, and glacial isostatic adjustment.

A moderate and a warmer climate change scenario are considered, yielding a global mean sea-level rise of 0.53 ± 0.18 m and 0.72 ± 0.27 m respectively (mean ± 1σ). Regionally however, we find that changes can reach up to 30% higher in coastal regions along the North Atlantic Ocean and along the Antarctic Circumpolar Current, and up to 20% in the subtropical and equatorial regions.

Limited sea-level rise down to 50% of the global mean value is projected for the subpolar North Atlantic Ocean, the Arctic Ocean and off the western Antarctic coast.

The uncertainty estimates for each component demonstrate that the land ice contribution dominates the total uncertainty.

#GHconf2013