EarthRef.org Reference Database (ERR)
Development and Maintenance by the EarthRef.org Database Team

Detailed Reference Information
Woth 2005
Woth, K. (2005). North Sea storm surge statistics based on projections in a warmer climate: How important are the driving GCM and the chosen emission scenario?. Geophysical Research Letters 32: doi: 10.1029/2005GL023762. issn: 0094-8276.

Climate models, simulating the effect of plausible future emission concentrations (scenarios), describe for the future an increase of high wind speeds over Northwest Europe during winter. With the help of a hydrodynamic model of the North Sea, these atmospheric future conditions are used to project storm surge heights for the Northwest European Shelf Sea. Four different projections are presented, all generated with the same Regional Climate Model, which itself is driven with two different Global Climate Model scenarios both exposed to two different emission scenarios. The analyses are carried out for a 30-year time-slice at the end of the 21st century. All four ensemble members point to a significant increase of storm surge elevations for the continental North Sea coast of between 15 and almost 25 cm. However, the different storm surge projections are not statistically distinguishable from each other but can provide a range of possible evolutions of surge extremes in a warmer climate.

BACKGROUND DATA FILES

Abstract

Keywords
Hydrology, Extreme events, Global Change, Regional climate change, Hydrology, Uncertainty assessment, Atmospheric Processes, Climate change and variability (1616, 1635, 3309, 4215, 4513), Oceanography, General, Numerical modeling (0545, 0560)
Journal
Geophysical Research Letters
http://www.agu.org/journals/gl/
Publisher
American Geophysical Union
2000 Florida Avenue N.W.
Washington, D.C. 20009-1277
USA
1-202-462-6900
1-202-328-0566
service@agu.org
Click to clear formClick to return to previous pageClick to submit