As the Industrial Age progressed, scientists discovered that present rates of sea level rise started to emerge in 1863, coinciding with indications of early ocean warming and glacier melt. The research will aid local and regional planners in preparing for future sea-level rise by using a worldwide database of sea-level records covering the previous 2,000 years.
Modern rates of sea level rise started developing in 1863 as the Industrial Age progressed, corresponding with evidence for early ocean warming and glacier melt, according to an international team of scientists led by Rutgers academics.
The research will aid local and regional planners in preparing for future sea-level rise by using a worldwide database of sea-level records covering the previous 2,000 years. The research was published in Nature Communications.
The increase of the sea level is a key signal of greater climate change. The researchers were able to pinpoint the start of a substantial era of climate change by determining when present rates of sea-level rise exceeded natural fluctuation.
The researchers discovered that the beginning of present rates of sea-level rise started globally in 1863, coinciding with the Industrial Revolution. Modern rates first appeared in the mid-Atlantic area in the mid- to late-nineteenth century, and then subsequently throughout Canada and Europe, by the mid-twentieth century.
The research comes at a good moment, considering NOAA’s recent report on the dramatic acceleration of sea-level rise along the United States’ coastlines.
“We can almost certainly say that the global rate of sea-level rise from 1940 to 2000 was faster than all previous 60-year intervals over the last 2,000 years,” said Jennifer S. Walker, lead author of the study and postdoctoral associate at Rutgers University-New Brunswick’s Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences. “For regional and local planning and reaction to future sea level rise, a full knowledge of site-specific sea-level variations over long durations is essential.”
Walker pointed out that the statistical model used by the study team might be extended to more specific locations to learn more about the mechanisms that drive sea-level rise on global and regional scales.
“The fact that present rates appear at all of our research locations by the mid-twentieth century illustrates the substantial impact that global sea-level rise has had on our world in the previous century,” Walker said. “Further research on the geographical variability in the timing of emergence at various places will continue to increase society’s knowledge of how regional and local mechanisms influence sea-level rise rates.”