T146 Recent Sea-Level Rise: Accelerating or Not?

Tuesday, 6 November 2012
8:00 AM - 12:00 PM
218AB

CAN WE DETERMINTE ACCELERATION RATES YET?

Paper number: T146-5
Program: Technical Sessions
Time: 9:10 AM – 9:25 AM

Authors

  • Gary T. Mitchum Presenting Author
    College of Marine Science, University of South Florida, Saint Petersburg, FL

Abstract

Determining the acceleration in the sea level change rate is arguably the most important question in front of the sea level research community today. This tells us whether the climate change models are correct, and tells us what steps society should take in the near future. This comes down to statistics. I would argue that some recent papers on this topic have not dealt with this carefully, which is not acceptable for a topic that is so critically important for our future.

In this talk I will present simulations and analysis that address the basic question, "How well can we determine the sea level acceleration rate and how long will it take?"

The bottom line is that at the global scale the time series is too short. At the regional scale we can determine acceleration, but these changes are not likely to be relevant to the global change issue. At the local scale, we cannot do much at all.