Monitoring sea level in the coastal zone with coastal altimetry and tide gauges
Monitoring sea level in the coastal zone with coastal altimetry and tide gauges
We examine the issue of sustained measurements of sea level in the coastal zone, first by summarizing the long-term observations from tide gauges, then showing how those are now complemented by improved altimetry products in the coastal ocean. We present some of the progresses in coastal altimetry, both from dedicated reprocessing of the radar waveforms and from the development of improved corrections for the atmospheric effects. This trend towards better altimetric data at the coast comes also from technological innovations such as Ka-band altimetry and SAR altimetry, and we discuss the advantages deriving from the AltiKa Ka-band altimeter and the SIRAL altimeter on CryoSat-2 that can be operated in SAR mode. A case study along the UK coast demonstrates the good agreement between coastal altimetry and tide gauge observations, with RMSD's as low as 4 cm at many stations, allowing the characterization of the annual cycle of sea level along the UK coasts. Finally we examine the evolution of the sea level trend from the open to the coastal ocean along the Western coast of Africa, comparing standard and coastally-improved products. Different products give different sea level trend profiles, so the recommendation is that additional efforts are needed to study sea level trends in the coastal zone from past and present altimeters. Further improvements are expected from more refined processing and screening of data, but in particular from the constant improvements in the geophysical corrections.
Sea Level, Coastal Zone, Radar Altimetry, Coastal Altimetry, Tide Gauge
33-57
Cipollini, Paolo
276e356a-f29e-4192-98b3-9340b491dab8
Calafat, Francisco M.
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Jevrejeva, Svetlana
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Melet, Angelique
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Prandi, Pierre
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1 January 2017
Cipollini, Paolo
276e356a-f29e-4192-98b3-9340b491dab8
Calafat, Francisco M.
f97617bd-0238-48e6-b693-7d409ac30c47
Jevrejeva, Svetlana
237423c0-e564-442f-9a85-0cadf056a32d
Melet, Angelique
e370705a-aae4-4337-b67f-a3a1475acc0e
Prandi, Pierre
0bd26332-f3b5-4aa7-afe1-cfae3de09a4e
Cipollini, Paolo, Calafat, Francisco M., Jevrejeva, Svetlana, Melet, Angelique and Prandi, Pierre
(2017)
Monitoring sea level in the coastal zone with coastal altimetry and tide gauges.
Surveys in Geophysics, 38 (1), .
(doi:10.1007/s10712-016-9392-0).
Abstract
We examine the issue of sustained measurements of sea level in the coastal zone, first by summarizing the long-term observations from tide gauges, then showing how those are now complemented by improved altimetry products in the coastal ocean. We present some of the progresses in coastal altimetry, both from dedicated reprocessing of the radar waveforms and from the development of improved corrections for the atmospheric effects. This trend towards better altimetric data at the coast comes also from technological innovations such as Ka-band altimetry and SAR altimetry, and we discuss the advantages deriving from the AltiKa Ka-band altimeter and the SIRAL altimeter on CryoSat-2 that can be operated in SAR mode. A case study along the UK coast demonstrates the good agreement between coastal altimetry and tide gauge observations, with RMSD's as low as 4 cm at many stations, allowing the characterization of the annual cycle of sea level along the UK coasts. Finally we examine the evolution of the sea level trend from the open to the coastal ocean along the Western coast of Africa, comparing standard and coastally-improved products. Different products give different sea level trend profiles, so the recommendation is that additional efforts are needed to study sea level trends in the coastal zone from past and present altimeters. Further improvements are expected from more refined processing and screening of data, but in particular from the constant improvements in the geophysical corrections.
Text
Monitoring sea level in the coastal zone revised.pdf
- Accepted Manuscript
Text
art%3A10.1007%2Fs10712-016-9392-0.pdf
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More information
Accepted/In Press date: 23 October 2016
e-pub ahead of print date: 18 November 2016
Published date: 1 January 2017
Keywords:
Sea Level, Coastal Zone, Radar Altimetry, Coastal Altimetry, Tide Gauge
Organisations:
Marine Physics and Ocean Climate
Identifiers
Local EPrints ID: 401945
URI: http://eprints.soton.ac.uk/id/eprint/401945
ISSN: 0169-3298
PURE UUID: 16aed4bb-450d-4886-9760-e9de30de4e8b
Catalogue record
Date deposited: 24 Oct 2016 10:24
Last modified: 15 Mar 2024 06:00
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Contributors
Author:
Paolo Cipollini
Author:
Francisco M. Calafat
Author:
Svetlana Jevrejeva
Author:
Angelique Melet
Author:
Pierre Prandi
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