Slower long-term coastal warming drives dampened trends in coastal marine heatwave exposure

Abstract

A Marine Heatwave (MHW) is an extreme oceanic heat event that has potentially devastating consequences on marine ecosystems and negative impacts on the fisheries industry economy. Such events have been found to be increasing in occurrence, intensity and duration globally (

Southern hemisphere eastern boundary upwelling systems emerging as future marine heatwave hotspots under greenhouse warming

“…This study provides insight into the response of MHWs in the EBUSs to greenhouse warming and its underlying dynamics, suggesting that the Southern Hemisphere EBUSs would become local hotspots of MHWs in the future and challenging the prevailing hypothesis [12][13][14][15][16][17]21,22 that the EBUSs serve as thermal refugia in a warming climate. So far, anthropogenic eastern boundary current changes have received less attention compared to their western boundary counterparts 48,49 .…”

“…In addition, the upwelled cold subsurface water is suggested to buffer the SST increase under greenhouse warming [12][13][14][15][16][17] . This argument is supported by the slower mean-state warming and MHW statistics increase in the EBUSs than in the adjacent ocean, according to the satellite observations during the past several decades, leading the community to hypothesize that the EBUSs will serve as thermal refugia in a warming climate [12][13][14][15][16][17]21,22 .…”