I got a couple of emails today saying that I should take a look at the most recently posted sea level graph from the University of Colorado shown below:
The reason for the interest is that it dropped the rate of change from 3.3 mm/yr to 3.2 mm/yr. as shown in the next graph. That’s hardly news, since it is well within the error band of +/- 0.4 mm/yr.
But I thought it might be interesting to go back and see what I could find in the UC sea level archive of graphs. I’ve presented all of the ones I’ve found below. I should note that in some years, UC may only release 2 graphs (as indicated by the release #) or up to 5 in one year like they did in 2005. For the sake of presentation simplicity, I’m only presenting the last graph to be released in any year.
I realize there has been a great deal of interest in the flattening of the 60 day smoothing line that started in 2007 and continues to the present. But the trend line will take awhile to reflect any appreciable change in the rate if it continues to flatten. The yearly rate of rise has been between 3.0 and 3.5 mm per year since 2004.
Many projections by various models predict the rise of sea level:
Note the trend of the observations line from 1950 to 2000, if you follow the linear trend, it will end up somewhere between 20 and 30 cm by the year 2100. The graph above is from Wikipedia’s “global warming art” which for some reason doesn’t show the observations back that far.
Here is a better graph, from New Zealand’s Ministry of the Environment, which shows more of the historical record, all the way back to 1870:
It seems sea level has been rising for awhile, and that the observation line in black, if you follow the linear trend, will also end up somewhere between 20 and 30 cm by the year 2100.
To put it all in perspective, some example images are useful.
Here is what 3 millmeters of sea level rise in 1 year looks like. This is a tiny fuel cell chip, just 3mm x 3mm in size:
I know that many people are concerned about sea level rise over the next century. In the rate of 3 mm per year continues, we’d be at 300 mm (30 centimeters) of rise in 100 years. Here is what 30.48 cm (12 inches) looks like:
And finally, here is what the tide gauge at Anchorage Alaska looks like:
Anchorage Alaska boasts the world’s second highest tides: varying over 40 feet (1219 cm), low to high tide. Ok, that is an extreme example, how about this one in France:
Mt. St. Michel on the north coast of France at low tide (left) and high tide (right).
The water surrounding this island is the Gulf of Sant-Malo.
Low tide
The point I’m making is that in 100 years, for some places that extra foot won’t make much of a difference. Some low lying areas will be affected certainly, but even some of the lowest lying areas of the earth won’t see all that much impact from a third of a meter of sea level rise in 100 years. Probably the worst place to live is in a river delta which is almost at sea level anyway. Even so, 30 cm falls short of the lowest notch on this graph of 1 meter.
Bangladesh is another low lying river delta where it is not desirable to live, yet many do. Even so it appears much of it is 1 meter or more above sea level.
Florida is often talked about as being at risk. yes there are a few places there that might be touched by a 30 cm rise in sea level 100 years from now.
Looking at the whole world, at the rate we are going, I’d say it will take awhile.
David L. Hagen (07:32:01) :
“The primary cause of delta fatalities are cyclones (hurricanes) and water born diseases.”
I’m not sure David if you are criticizing or not my issue that the Ganges delta will grow along with sea level which is the behaviour of all deltas. I do agree that you are correct regarding primary cause of delta fatalities but I am only trying to assure that this problem will not be changed for the worse by gradually rising sea level.
So I’ll bite,
Why is it that the data for earlier years (the red dots) keeps on changing even in 2009. Are these people just making up data as they go.
I gather from the graphs that the correct result is supposed to be a perfect straight line, so all those point deviations from the straight line are just random noise.
Looking at the green dots in the first graph, it seems that the best fit curve to the dots starts flattening around 2004 or earlier, and the flattening accelerates around 2006, so in a few years it would seem to be turning down if the flattening and the acceleration increases as the recent data shows.
And just what part of the earth’s oceans does this refer to, since the Arctic ocean has actually been falling at least for about the ten years ending mid 2006 (based on European satellite measurements.
So why then do all the distant future predictions show an ever accelerating upward trend.
Oh I forgot, these are future predictions from a computer video game, and not actual physical data.
What if all those dots; well I suppose they are really circles, turned out to be actual measured values; meaning that is what the sea level was when theat particular circle was measured. If those were actual meausred sea levels, what is the purpose of the wavy blue line which seems to ignorte most of the circles, and then what is the straight black line for since the circles are clearly not following that black line.
It would help if these “scientists” published a physical equation that says what the sea level should be.
After all Max Planck managed to publish an equation for the spectral emittance of a black body radiator, wherein all the parameters in the equation are known exactly in terms of a few fundamental constants of the whole universe, that are mostly known to about 8 significant digits. Come to think of it, Max didn’t even have a real black body radiator to take measurments from; yet everybody who has made one since has been able to confirm his theory to the ultimate limits of experimental measurement.
It seems to me that one of those achievements is science and the other is largely nonsense.
Scientists should refrain from draweing straight lines on what purports to be experimental data graphs, unless they also provide the theoretical equation that describes that straight line, and explains the physical phenomenon being graphed.
Yes I think the problem can be described largely by saying that Meteorology is a complex, and somewhat inexact science that rests on real physics and chemistry and suffers from a lack of information to close the gaps; while Climatology which seems to be the snootier of the two; is in about the samer category as Astrology and Economics; and isn’t based on any theoretical models of any planet that we know about.
When the climate models can be run backwards to produce the original data on which Hansen’s AlGorythm for GISStemp is based; then the promoters of that pseudo-science may start getting noticed.
Note that the smooth of the sea level data is always huge. In this case, the smooth is decadal. The raw data clearly shows that there is significant variation in the rise of sea level during the past century; however the smooth removes this information
” Taxes are higher. Energy is more expensive, and less reliable. Other problems we didn’t even expect have surfaced. At that point I look at that graph in 2012. I see no sea level rise in 8 years, and now I’m pissed. In my average guy brain, I finally, fully get how bad I’ve been swindled.”
And that, sir, is why these graphs must be continually homogenized, massaged and tortured for your pleasure.
It seems to me that satellites basically overstate the sea level that really matters. I suggest that the only sea level that matters is the one that is measured from shore. Aren’t we only concerned with encroachment to shore structures and features? Does it really matter how much the western pacific rises if you can’t measure the rise from shore?
Thats what I like about you, Anthony, you are on to the “level!”
crosspatch (00:08:07) :
Your wish is my command.
http://i599.photobucket.com/albums/tt74/MartinGAtkins/selevel2006.jpg
Watching the record of sea level rise is about as exciting as watching grass grow.
Oh, wait. In a couple more weeks or so the grass will be more exciting and it’ll be time to pull the mower out of winter storage. With nearly an acre of grass to cover {and it’s not a riding mower – hey, exercise is exercise}, by the time the backyard is finished it’ll be time to start over in front.
As for sea level change, get over it. It’s been changing since the end of the ice age (the real one, not just the little one). Now, if sea levels start dropping, then that’ll be something to start being concerned about.
“So the measurement accuracy of the instruments on these satellites is an order of magnitude less than the changes they purport to measure. How does that work, exactly?”
I will show you how. Here are 5 measurements from some instrument having a resolution of 1 unit. So the error could be +- 0.5 units
14
2
18
53
32
The average is 23.8 so I report that number. Now lets see what happens when one of them changes. Say 53 changes to 52 … average changes to 23.6 so a “global” change of .2 is reported.
The thing being measured didn’t change “globally” but the global average of individual readings did. So what does that 0.2 change mean to someone who wasn’t at the point reporting 53 units of measure? Absolutely nothing. Nothing changed. AND people are mislead into believing there was a “global” change of 0.2 which is less than the margin of error for any of the measuring locations.
This is the problem with using stations that were designed to observe weather for long term climate research. When you have rates of change of a tenth of a degree per decade you are within the margin of error of drift for an instrument or an eyeball reading a thermometer.
Things such as “average global temperature” or “average global sea level” are meaningless. Temperature variations cause more sea level change than “melting” ice caps. Sea level hasn’t risen since 2006 because the Pacific has cooled. When the water cools, it contracts and sea level drops. And a local change in the mid Pacific that changes the “global average” doesn’t mean that sea level changed at all in New York.
Kaboom (03:57:21) :
Andrew P (01:52:43)
The converse is also true:
If the seal levels are falling, polar bears have less to eat.
Less food for polar bears = reduced population thereof.
Less seal levels = less polar bear levels
Less seal and polar bear levels = less mass.
Less mass = less displacement.
Andrew P = A Big “F”.
QED 🙂
But if fewer seals = more fish
And more fish = more displacement
Or do you want to take this all the way down to phytoplankton? Methinks you take my first post too seriously.
DJ (01:33:42) :
“3mm rise per year will lead to an average coastal recession of 3cm to 30cm per year for sandy beaches – that puts places like Florida in line for more than 100 feet of coastal recession this century with a low end sea level rise. This simple fact is captured in Brunn’s rule which is well known to scientists. Here’s some examples of what happens when sea level rise meets people…
http://www.smh.com.au/news/national/byron-bay-wont-budge-over-rising-sea-liability/2007/05/19/1179497333614.html
http://informet.net/tuvmet/tide.html
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/5092218.stm
200 million people live within 1m of sea level… so these stories will be repeated countless times this coming century”.
DJ,
Especially sandy beaches will adapt to higher sea levels.
A sand beach is the result of the tides adding sand to the beach and the wind blowing them into dunes.
That is how a beach is formed and it is the best tidal defense for millions of years.
Next to catastrophic run away climate caused by CO2, rising sea levels are the second biggest hoax in the Green Box of Pandora, together with the hoax of the melting ice caps.
It’s all propaganda for dummies.
ralph ellis (06:00:29) :
.
“What about this analysis, that argues against historic sea-level rises (last 100 years or so).
http://www.john-daly.com/ges/msl-rept.htm
Any flaws in what is argued here?”
The post glacial rebound (PGR) is very real. Its affects are most easily observed in the the Hudson’s Bay region where rebound averaged 1metre per hundred years:
http://encarta.msn.com/encyclopedia_461511036/Hudson_Bay_Lowlands.html
The aspect of PGR that makes determining historic changes in actual sea level more complicated than just trying to compensate for the rising of land in the northern hemisphere in particular, is the fact that the adjacent seabed is also rising and spilling water southward causing the water to rise relative to the land away from the northern lattitudes. Geologists have attempted to estimate the viscosity or plasticity of the mantle of the earth out of scientific interest but few, I would wager, would be comfortable in its application in calculating such small annual overall sea level changes when so many other determinants are at play.
Hello,
Did you get my links to sea level graphics?
I’ll try one mor time:
http://klimakatastrophe.wordpress.com/
Number 1 (Teil 1) is on the previous page.
Regards
Edouard
Ok it works now! Here are the 3 parts :
http://klimakatastrophe.wordpress.com/2009/03/22/beschleunigt-sich-der-globale-meeresspiegelanstieg/
http://klimakatastrophe.wordpress.com/2009/03/27/beschleunigt-sich-der-globale-meeresspiegelanstieg-teil2/
http://klimakatastrophe.wordpress.com/2009/03/28/beschleunigt-sich-der-meeresspiegelanstieg-teil3/
It’s in german but the graphs can be understood … 😉
Best regards
Edouard
Good point; sounds plausible and relevant to me.
Ouhps, SORRY, I posted them twice …
There is an offset in the Topex and Jason data in the sense that Jason measures 4 +- mm more as of 2002.
This is visible by the many green points above the average line after 2002.
This contributes to a somewhat higher average value in mm/year.
An inconvenitent truth. The NOAA website has data from a tide station in Santa Barbara, CA. The data has time breaks in it. The most recent set of sea level measurements is clearly lower than the previous set.
Harold Ambler (06:10:09) :
Yes, one of those really smart people was a gentleman named Ward Churchill.
He was caught lying and committing plagiarism in his writings. He was fired.
He sued to get his job back. He won.
So he will be back soon, teaching at CU.
Perhaps the AGW stuff is another symptom of the Ward Churchill syndrome?
Coral atolls (such as the Maldives) are amongst the lowest lying land areas in the world, so one would think they are particularly vulnerable to sea level increases. But they’re constantly replenished by ongoing coral growth at their peripheries. Indeed it is characteristic of atolls that they are effectively live-coral outlines of ancient islands that eroded away long ago. Darwin originally speculated that the coral limestone skeletal deposits were immensely deep, and it has since been demonstrated that some atolls are solid limestone extending down a kilometer or more. Atolls are inherently at present sea level because they can’t deposit limestone much above sea level, and erosion rapidly removes any exposed dead materials.
The fastest growing stony corals (the Acropora etc) grow at over 150mm per year and hence dominate atoll deposition. Even the phylogenetically older stony corals grow at over 50mm per year. 3mm per year could not possibly drown corals. Atolls would be safe at even 10X higher rates of sea level increase.
As well as growing in place, all coral organisms reproduce and propagate by releasing massive numbers of a motile spore-like form that can travel potentially great distances to establish new colonies. Even in the event of a dramatic one-time increase in sea levels, corals would survive by establishing new colonies anywhere they could find favorable conditions.
The same mechanism would be used by corals to survive any substantive global warming. Stony corals are currently confined to tropical waters because they’re temperature limited — 22C is about the minimum sustained cold they can endure. With higher temperatures they would rapidly establish new colonies in more temperate latitudes.
Given the .5C temperature increase measured during the last century, coral ranges must have already been extended some measurable amount, and indeed this is documented in the literature.
It’s perhaps unsurprising that coral’s ability to positively adapt to warming conditions goes unmentioned in popular accounts.
Craig Allen (01:02:02):”Because sea levels have been relatively constant for a few thousand years…”
Wrong as usual, Craig. And since that particular statement is the crux of your argument, your argument fails: click
As can be seen in the graph, the sea level is still increasing in what appears to be a flattening curve. Most of the post-Ice Age rise is past, but a very small decadal increase remains.
And as always, it must be kept in mind that the current sea level rise is the result of natural climate variability. The theory of natural climate variability has never been falsified. And unless natural climate variability is falsified, the AGW/CO2 hypothesis fails.
The burden is on the promoters of the new AGW/CO2 hypothesis to falsify natural variability — not vice-versa. Since they have failed, the AGW/CO2 hypothesis is falsified: click [chart by Bill Illis].
Smokey:
Congratulations!, you just found a most convenient Hockey Stick!
I see dead……I mean Hockey Sticks!
Mike asked, “Does that data also remove the “shifting zero” that Katherine brought up?”
I only downloaded the most recent data set…So the “shifting zero” isn’t an issue. I’m fairly certain that only the most recent data is available to be downloaded directly from the CU site.
I’ve been playing around with the correlating the CU sea level data to the UAH Lower Trop. Ocean and Land temperature data. The Lower Trop. Ocean temperature correlates very well with the CU Sea level data right up until mid-2004. At that point the temperature data starts to show a clear cooling trend; while sea level continued to rise (albeit more slowly)…Although the onset of oceanic cooling in 2003-2004 does seem to correlate to the flattening of the seal level rise. Now that the land temperatures are also cooling…I’ll bet that sea level starts to decline over the next 20 years.
The Jerejeeva reconstruction clearly shows a hiatus of sea level rise (if not an actual declining of sea level) from 1942-1978…Coincident with the last cold phase of the PDO/QDO. Those sea level data can be accessed through the Proudman Oceanographic Laboratory’s website.
Great post. Two points, though. The Mississippi Delta is already dissappear because of erosion-there is an extensive plan to correct the outflow so that silt will be deposited were it was before the river was redirected, allowing the Delta to re-expand. The second point is that sea level trends regionally depend on various factors and may rise more or less than globally. Notice that in Aukland, there is little difference between the 40’s and recent data. 🙂