Sea level rise is an indicator of the progress of climate change, and by determining when global sea level rise began, we can identify the onset of climate change.
And that date was much older in time than is commonly assumed, because it was 1863. That’s when the industrial revolution began to have its effects on climate on a global scale. world.
That’s according to a team of scientists who looked at a global database of sea level records over the past 2,000 years and concluded that in 1863 there was a remarkable rise.
“Having a thorough understanding of sea level changes at specific sites over long time scales is imperative for regional and local planning and response to future sea level rise,” says Jennifer S. Walker, postdoctoral associate in the Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences at Rutgers. University-New Brunswick, who was the lead author of a study on the outcomes.
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Sea level rise has not been uniform
Some regions took decades longer to experience change, but by the middle of the 20th century the rate of sea level rise began to accelerate, experts have found.
“We can be fairly certain that the overall rate of sea level rise between 1940 and 2000 was faster than all previous 60-year intervals over the past 2,000 years,” Walker said.
“The fact that modern rates are emerging at all of our study sites in the mid-twentieth century demonstrates the significant influence sea level rise has had on our planet over the past century,” he said. he.
And things can only get worse. In a comprehensive new report, for example, scientists say that in the United States alone, seawater along coasts will be 0.25 meters to 0.3 meters higher by the middle of this century. than it currently is.
“Sea level rise will create a profound change in coastal flooding over the next 30 years by causing increased tidal heights and storm surges that will extend further inland,” note the scientists in their report. “By 2050, ‘moderate’ (generally damaging) flooding is projected to occur, on average, more than 10 times more frequently than today, and could be intensified by local factors.”
By Daniel T. Cross. Articles in English