The Sea Level Response to External Forcings in Historical Simulations of CMIP5 Climate Models*

Slangen, Aimée B. A.; Church, John A.; Zhang, Xuebin; Monselesan, Didier

doi:10.1175/jcli-d-15-0376.1

Cited by 27 publications

(36 citation statements)

References 52 publications

(61 reference statements)

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“…The maps show low or negative SLR around the glaciers and ice sheets. As a result of projected changes in the ocean heat content and circulation, there is a dipolar band associated with a shift in the Antarctic Circumpolar Current stretching south of South Africa and Australia [30] and generally higher values in a wide band around the equator in the Indian and Pacific Oceans.…”

Section: Sea-level Projections For 2010-2100mentioning

confidence: 99%

The Impact of Uncertainties in Ice Sheet Dynamics on Sea-Level Allowances at Tide Gauge Locations

Slangen

Wal

Reerink

et al. 2017

JMSE

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Sea level is projected to rise in the coming centuries as a result of a changing climate. One of the major uncertainties is the projected contribution of the ice sheets in Greenland and Antarctica to sea-level rise (SLR). Here, we study the impact of different shapes of uncertainty distributions of the ice sheets on so-called sea-level allowances. An allowance indicates the height a coastal structure needs to be elevated to keep the same frequency and likelihood of sea-level extremes under a projected amount of mean SLR. Allowances are always larger than the projected SLR. Their magnitude depends on several factors, such as projection uncertainty and the typical variability of the extreme events at a location. Our results show that allowances increase significantly for ice sheet dynamics' uncertainty distributions that are more skewed (more than twice, compared to Gaussian uncertainty distributions), due to the increased probability of a much larger ice sheet contribution to SLR. The allowances are largest in regions where a relatively small observed variability in the extremes is paired with relatively large magnitude and/or large uncertainty in the projected SLR, typically around the equator. Under the RCP8.5 (Representative Concentration Pathway) projections of SLR, the likelihood of extremes increases more than a factor 10 4 at more than 50-87% of the tide gauges.

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Section: Sea-level Projections For 2010-2100mentioning

confidence: 99%

The Impact of Uncertainties in Ice Sheet Dynamics on Sea-Level Allowances at Tide Gauge Locations

Slangen

Wal

Reerink

et al. 2017

JMSE

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“…In particular, Slangen et al (2015) carried out a detection study of human imprints on sea level patterns. Using the same set of numerical experiments as in Slangen et al (2014), they evaluated the modelled response of sea level to external forcings over the periods 1861-2005.…”

Section: Anthropogenic Signal In Regional Sea Level Trend Patternsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Although the physical relationship between the increase in ocean heat content and thermal expansion was appointed to an anthropogenic contribution to sea level rise (e.g., Barnett et al 2005;Gleckler et al 2012), and similarly the observed glacier mass loss and thus its contribution to sea level rise were attributed to human influence, the anthropogenic contributions could not yet be quantified at the time the last report of the IPCC was published. More recent attempts have shed some light on the anthropogenic origin of these two main contributors to global sea level rise and have quantified the human fingerprint for the periods in which there are independent observations (Marcos and Amores 2014;Slangen et al 2014Slangen et al , 2015Marzeion et al 2014). At the regional scale, D&A studies on sea level are highly challenging.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Internal Variability Versus Anthropogenic Forcing on Sea Level and Its Components

et al. 2016

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In this paper we review and update detection and attribution studies in sea level and its major contributors during the past decades. Tide gauge records reveal that the observed twentieth-century global and regional sea level rise is out of the bounds of its natural variability, evidencing thus a human fingerprint in the reported trends. The signal varies regionally, and it partly depends on the magnitude of the background variability. The human fingerprint is also manifested in the contributors of sea level for which observations are available, namely ocean thermal expansion and glaciers' mass loss, which dominated the global sea level rise over the twentieth century. Attribution studies provide evidence that the trends in both components are clearly dominated by anthropogenic forcing over the second half of the twentieth century. In the earlier decades, there is a lack of observations hampering an improved attribution of causes to the observed sea level rise. At certain locations along the coast, the human influence is exacerbated by local coastal activities that induce land subsidence and increase the risk of sea level-related hazards.

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“…Consequently, accurate projections can be made by scaling a fixed pattern with a time-dependent magnitude, as for surface air temperature, but ocean volume-mean temperature is generally a slightly more accurate predictor than global mean surface air temperature for scaling the pattern of sea level change. Recent work has begun to explore the impact of individual radiative forcings (greenhouse gases, aerosols, and natural forcing) on historical sea level change [166].…”

Section: Regional Projections and Emergence Time Of The Forced Signalmentioning

confidence: 99%

Recent Progress in Understanding and Projecting Regional and Global Mean Sea Level Change

Clark

Church

Gregory

et al. 2015

Curr Clim Change Rep

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Considerable progress has been made in understanding the present and future regional and global sea level in the 2 years since the publication of the Fifth Assessment Report (AR5) of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. Here, we evaluate how the new results affect the AR5's assessment of (i) historical sea level rise, including attribution of that rise and implications for the sea level budget, (ii) projections of the components and of total global mean sea level (GMSL), and (iii) projections of regional variability and emergence of the anthropogenic signal. In each of these cases, new work largely provides additional evidence in support of the AR5 assessment, providing greater confidence in those findings. Recent analyses confirm the twentieth century sea level rise, with some analyses showing a slightly smaller rate before 1990 and some a slightly larger value than reported in the AR5. There is now more evidence of an acceleration in the rate of rise. Ongoing ocean heat uptake and associated thermal expansion have continued since 2000, and are consistent with ocean thermal expansion reported in the AR5. A significant amount of heat is being stored deeper in the water column, with a larger rate of heat uptake since 2000 compared to the previous decades and with the largest storage in the Southern Ocean. The first formal detection studies for ocean thermal expansion and glacier mass loss since the AR5 have confirmed the AR5 finding of a significant anthropogenic contribution to sea level rise over the last 50 years. New projections of glacier loss from two regions suggest smaller contributions to GMSL rise from these regions than in studies assessed by the AR5; additional regional studies are required to further assess whether there are broader implications of these results. Mass loss from the Greenland Ice Sheet, primarily as a result of increased surface melting, and from the Antarctic Ice Sheet, primarily as a result of increased ice discharge, has accelerated. The largest estimates of acceleration in mass loss from the two ice sheets for 2003-2013 equal or exceed the acceleration of GMSL rise calculated from the satellite altimeter sea level record over the longer period of 1993-2014. However, when increased mass gain in land water storage and parts of East Antarctica, and decreased mass loss from glaciers in Alaska and some other regions are taken into account, the net acceleration in the ocean mass gain is consistent with the satellite altimeter record. New studies suggest that a marine ice sheet instability (MISI) may have been initiated in parts of the West Antarctic Ice Sheet (WAIS), but that it will affect only a limited number of ice streams in the twenty-first century. New projections of mass loss from the Greenland and Antarctic Ice Sheets by 2100, including a contribution from parts of WAIS undergoing unstable retreat, suggest a contribution that falls largely within the likely range (i.e., two thirds probability) of the AR5. These new results increase confidence in the AR5 likel...

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The Sea Level Response to External Forcings in Historical Simulations of CMIP5 Climate Models*

Cited by 27 publications

References 52 publications

The Impact of Uncertainties in Ice Sheet Dynamics on Sea-Level Allowances at Tide Gauge Locations

The Impact of Uncertainties in Ice Sheet Dynamics on Sea-Level Allowances at Tide Gauge Locations

Internal Variability Versus Anthropogenic Forcing on Sea Level and Its Components

Recent Progress in Understanding and Projecting Regional and Global Mean Sea Level Change

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