Projected sea level changes in China marginal seas based on dynamical downscaling — Australian Meteorological and Oceanographic Society
  1. Schedule
  2. 22(ii). Regional climate projections and applications
  3. Projected sea level changes in China marginal seas based on dynamical downscaling

Projected sea level changes in China marginal seas based on dynamical downscaling (#238)

YI JIN 1 2 , Xuebin Zhang 3 , John A. Church 4 , Xianwen Bao 1 5
  1. College of Oceanic and Atmospheric Sciences, Ocean University of China, Qingdao, Shandong, China
  2. CSIRO Ocean and Atmosphere, Hobart, Tasmania, Australia
  3. Centre for Southern Hemisphere Oceans Research (CSHOR), CSIRO Oceans and Atmosphere, Hobart, Tasmania, Australia
  4. Climate Change Research Centre, University of New South Wales, Sydney, New South Wales, Australia
  5. Key Laboratory of Physical Oceanography, Ministry of Educationand, and Qingdao National Laboratory for Marine Science and Technology, Qingdao, Shandong, China

The regional sea level projections are usually produced based on global climate models (GCMs). However, the sea level changes in shallow coastal regions like China marginal seas cannot be fully described by GCMs due to their coarser resolutions (typical 1o). To improve the regional sea level simulation, a high-resolution (~7 km) regional ocean model based on Regional Ocean Modeling System (ROMS) is set up in China marginal seas for both historical and future periods. Validation of model simulation during the historical period over 1994-2015 against available oceanic observations indicates that this regional model can reproduce historical ocean states reasonably well. The same model is then integrated into the future period (2079-2100), driven by climate changes signals from GCMs via boundary and surface conditions. The downscaled climate changes in the ocean, including sea level changes, can be derived by comparing historical and future experiments. By applying different climate change signals under various emission scenarios, sensitivity of sea level changes to emission pathways can be quantified. Moreover, the contributions from ocean (via open boundary) and atmosphere (via surface forcing) can be separated by sensitivity experiments. This dynamical downscaling study provides more detailed sea level projections in China coastal regions, which should be useful for adaptation and mitigation planning for future sea level rise.

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