Collaborative Research: The Physics and Statistics of Global Sea Level Change

海平面上升(在一些地方，海平面下降)是正在进行的环境变化中最麻烦的问题之一，潜在和可能的影响为不可避免的适应带来了巨大的成本。尽管越来越多的文献讨论了过去、现在和未来的海平面变化，但对区域和全球平均海平面变化的原因的定量理解仍然很差？因为这种变化反映了物理海洋学、大地测量学、冰川学和气象学的一些最基本的因素，包括不完善和变化的观测系统造成的偏差，以及海洋模型中微小但累积的误差。几乎所有由此产生的问题都在数量庞大且不断增长的文献中的某个地方进行了讨论，但主要是孤立地进行讨论。该项目的目的是将一个特别改编的海洋环流模式和所有现有数据合并为一个框架，以量化区域和全球海平面变化的原因。独立但重叠的努力将针对1992年以来的时期(S)，以及在此之前数据更为稀疏的时期。智力价值：了解海平面上升的组成部分、空间分布和速度具有巨大的社会后果。海平面每年上升1毫米，而海平面每年上升4毫米，持续25年意味着适应成本在数量级上有所不同。观察到的地区变化速度，这是具有社会重要性的变化，比两个迹象都大一个数量级。更深远的影响：目前还不能做出可信的预测，这项工作应该朝着这一目标迈出重要的一步。影响和适应战略不是这项建议的一部分，但任何关心这些问题的人都应该对此感兴趣。

Sea level rise (and in some places, sea level fall) is one of the most troublesome of ongoing environmental changes, with potential and likely impacts generating huge costs for inevitable adaptation. Despite a growing literature discussing past, present and future sea level shifts, quantitative understanding of the causes of both regional and global mean sea level change remains quite poor?because the shifts reflect some of the most basic elements of physical oceanography, geodesy, glaciology, and meteorology, including biases from inadequate and shifting observation systems and small but accumulating errors in ocean models. Almost all of the resulting issues are discussed somewhere in the voluminous and growing literature, but primarily in isolation. The intent of this project is to combine into one framework, that of a specially adapted ocean general circulation model and all of the available data, to quantify the causes of regional and global sea levelchange. Separate, but overlapping efforts would be directed to the period(s) since 1992, and the much more data sparse periods prior to that time.Intellectual Merit: Understanding of the components, spatial distribution and rates of sea level rise has enormous social consequences. A sea level rise of 1 mm per year versus one of 4 mm per year sustained for 25 years implies adaptation costs that differ by orders of magnitude. Observed regional rates of change, which are the ones of societal importance, are more than an order of magnitude greater and of both signs.Broader Impacts: At the present time one cannot make credible predictions, and this work should take a major step toward that goal. Impacts and adaptation strategies are not part of this proposal, but it should be of interest to anyone concerned about those problems.