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Headings: 14. How fast is sea level rising?
14. How fast is sea level rising?
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Content: measurements from tide gauges (blue) and satellites (red) indicate that the best estimate for the average sea level rise over the last decade is centred on 3.6 mm per year (0.14 inches per year). The shaded area represents the sea level uncertainty, which has decreased as the number of gauge sites used in calculating the global averages and the number of data points have increased. Source: Shum and Kuo (2011) ( larger version)
This sea level rise has been driven by expansion of water volume as the ocean warms, melting of mountain glaciers in all regions of the world, and mass losses from the Greenland and Antarctic ice sheets. All of these result from a warming climate. Fluctuations in sea level also occur due to changes in the amounts of water stored on land. The amount of sea level change experienced at any given location also depends on a variety of other factors, including whether regional geological processes and rebound of the land weighted down by previous ice sheets are causing the land itself to rise or sink, and whether changes in winds and currents are piling ocean water against some coasts or moving water away. The effects of rising sea level are felt most acutely in the increased frequency and intensity of occasional storm surges. If CO 2 and other greenhouse gases continue to increase on their current trajectories, it is projected that sea level may rise, at minimum, by a further 0.4 to 0.8 m (1.3 to 2.6 feet) by 2100, although future ice sheet melt could make these values considerably higher. Moreover, rising sea levels will not stop in 2100;