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The section on Antarctica states, "The Antarctic ice sheet mass balance is affected by snowfall accumulations, and ice discharge along the periphery. Under the influence of global warming, melt at the base of the ice sheet increases. Simultaneously, the capacity of the atmosphere to carry precipitation increases with temperature so that precipitation, in the form of snowfall, increases. Furthermore, the additional snowfall causes increased ice flow which leads to further loss of ice" - this is the conclusion from a 2012 reference, however, the paragraph is too vague, because it does not mention regional trends, article statements are too bold. prokaryotes ( talk) 17:11, 15 January 2019 (UTC)
I've now been able to look in detail to the news article [1] and the new Rignot paper [2] which you have cited.
You stated that
Could you confirm that this is what you meant? Are you now convinced about snowfall causing more ice flow? We could change the sentence about snowfall accumulation to something like: While snowfall has increased over the last 200 years, in recent decades (1979-2017) is has remained fairly stable. Would you agree with that? Is it sufficiently relevant? It is okay if I remove the sentence on East Antarctica losing mass till this in confirmed by other techniques OR independent scientist form a consensus on the accuracy of this new article? Femkemilene ( talk) 12:53, 20 January 2019 (UTC)
I disagree with the statement that it's pretty much consensus. Both the NASA study (covering 1/8) and the Rignot study use the 'contributions' methodology I think (described in Rignot), while satellite methodology is pointing towards a possible increase in mass [6]. The NASA study is also in agreement with the satellite study, which states: "The approximate state of balance of the wider EAIS suggests that the reported dynamic thinning of the Totten and Cook glaciers85,86 has been offset by accumulation gains elsewhere87." Concretely, I think it is fair to include the study but not as the ultimate truth. So adding possibly before East Antarctica under the Antarctica subheading and summarizing study in East Antarctica subsubsection. Femkemilene ( talk) 20:15, 20 January 2019 (UTC)
Will answer more of your message later. If you don't have access to a university VPN, it is a shame that only illegal sites such as Sci-Hub exist to get access to publicly paid-for research with publishers making insane profits. Femkemilene ( talk) 16:51, 21 January 2019 (UTC)
The article had a mechanism section at least in 2018. I find it confusing to have content about mechanisms in many places, such as the section on contributions. The latest IPCC AR5 goes into details about mechanism, section 13.4.3.2 Dynamical Change, noting,"Observations suggest three main mechanisms by which climate change can affect the dynamics of ice flow in Greenland (Sections 4.4.3 and 4.4.4): by directly affecting ice loss (outflow) through the calving of icebergs and marine melt from marine-terminating outlet glaciers; by altering basal sliding through the interaction of surface melt water with the glacier bed; and indirectly through the interaction between SMB and ice flow. We assess the consequences of each of these processes."
I was made to understood talk pages shouldn't have votes, but move towards consensus with argumentation. Reading subsubsections 4.4.3 and 4.4.4 it is very clear that IPCC puts mechanisms of ice melt under a section heading of contributions (specifically: Projected Contributions to Global Mean Sea Level). I really don't understand what you would put under a section heading of contributions, if not also the mechanisms involved in those contributions. We agree that mechanisms should be put in one place, but I see no reason to deviate from IPCC and not put them under the contribution section. Similarly, the NCA also does not make some weird distinction between a 'contribution' section and a 'mechanisms' section, but instead have one heading with "12.2: Physical Factors Contributing to Sea Level Rise". In terms of newer result, please don't put out of proportion attention to them. We are not a newspaper and typically don't need quotes unless they have historical significance. Femkemilene ( talk) 21:27, 16 January 2019 (UTC)
See WP:NOTVOTE NewsAndEventsGuy ( talk) 23:03, 16 January 2019 (UTC)
I will reply assuming that my interpretation of your text is correct.
Every inch a marathon. Let's back up. I am frustrated at the talk talk talk and still not being clear what P wants either. So to back up, F attempted to summarize P's proposal in three steps, saying
1. Have all mechanisms in one section and thereby merging the sections contributions and regional sea level
2. Change the name of the contribution section to dynamical changes OR change the (sub)section title mechanisms to dynamical changes.
3. (least clear to me) change subsectioning under the 'contributions' section, with at least one section 'dynamics' and possibly other sections as well.
It would help us all, P, if you simply focused and said "yes that's right" or "no, change this word and add this nuance". So for pity's sake let's just focus on the big picture summation without rehashing rearguing redefending reexplaining readvocating.... For right now, I'd simply like to know if F accurately summarized the big picture for your desired changes? Once we have all agreed on the statement of the proposal, then we can make progress discussing its pros and cons. NewsAndEventsGuy ( talk) 14:07, 17 January 2019 (UTC)
NewsAndEventsGuy ( talk) 14:50, 17 January 2019 (UTC)
If we include a new subsubsubheading, Processes, Physical processes or mechanisms would capture all processes you are referring to. I'm happy we've reached consensus on the meaning of dynamics. You have not given me an answer to my question what other things than physical processes you would like under the section heading Contribution. Is it the numbers of past and potential sea level rise? The IPCC has three subsections under their future contributions section for Greenland and Antarctica, ALL dealing with quantifying and describing physical processes. What else do you expect under contributions? Femkemilene ( talk) 08:46, 19 January 2019 (UTC)
Some of the findings reported therein are likely relevant to the article and should probably be noted. See:
Zazpot ( talk) 22:45, 28 March 2019 (UTC)
I'd like to float a rewrite for the first paragraph under "21st century projections". IPCC did not really provide an upper limit to projections and the main hedge (as in prior reports) was ice sheet dynamics. (For more background see this RealClimate 2013 blog post). To try to convey this in a smooth way, lets kick around something like this proposed substitute text (with citation polishing after we have consensus on the text)
Although improved understanding has allowed the projection of a likely range of sea level rise during the 21st century, it has not been possible to quantify a very likely range or give an upper bound to future rise. The potential collapse of ice shelves, as observed on the Antarctic Peninsula (Rignot et al., 2004; Scambos et al., 2004; Rott et al., 2011), could lead to a larger 21st century rise of up to several tenths of a metre.
— IPCC AR5 WG1
Your comments? NewsAndEventsGuy ( talk) 20:24, 30 July 2019 (UTC)
References
I don't claim the "Map of the Earth with a long-term 6-metre (20 ft) sea level rise" is completely incorrect and it states some of its limitation ("uniform distribution, actual sea level rise will vary regionally") but it has some glaring problems that make me question if it adds any informative value to the article.
The amount of red color seems to increase more by the length of the coastline under each pixel than the land area that would be inundated. If there is a lot of skerries, islands, bays or peninsulas within a pixel the area will glow bright red and makes it look lake it would become completely deluged. Norway for example has large areas in the north marked with red although those areas are very mountaineous and having peaks rising almost straight up from the sea. See for example this Google Streetview from Norway. Everything visible is marked with red in the map. Also, not taking glacial rebound into account adds another problem because it is countering the sea level rise around that area with about 100% margin at the moment. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 85.23.42.147 ( talk) 21:05, 22 September 2019 (UTC)
Here's the second paragraph of the lede as currently written:
For example, in 2007 the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) projected a high end estimate of 60 cm (2 ft) through 2099,[6] but their 2014 report raised the high-end estimate to about 90 cm (3 ft).[7] A number of later studies have concluded that a global sea level rise of 200 to 270 cm (6.6 to 8.9 ft) this century is "physically plausible".[8][3][9] A conservative estimate of the long-term projections is that each Celsius degree of temperature rise triggers a sea level rise of approximately 2.3 meters (4.2 ft/degree Fahrenheit) over a period of two millennia (2,000 years): an example of climate inertia.[2]
The century-end projections used here are the high-end estimates and the most extreme "physically plausible" projection. In the apparent interest of providing balance, the paragraph then switches to providing a low-end estimate, but it is projected over the next 2000 years rather than only to century's end. In the interest of giving users the most accurate information possible (in a consistent way), shouldn't the lede provide in all cases: (1) the point estimate, which is the single best estimate, or (2) the upper and lower confidence limit on the projections, or preferably (3) the point estimate & the CLs?
Ditto for the "Projections for the 21st century" section. Why are some paragraphs written to provide an estimate of "up to ..." or "as much as ..." or "physically possible", whereas others do in fact provide the point estimates and/or CLs (not just the most alarming plausible value)? Is there an objective reason for providing the most alarming as opposed to the least alarming plausible values here?
Should these sections be rewritten to be more informative, unbiased, and consistent? Bueller 007 ( talk) 23:41, 16 August 2020 (UTC)
Perhaps someone can weave the following sources into the article. Apparently during the 1970s, peak dam construction slowed sea-level rise drastically. As researcher Thomas Frederikse put it, "We impounded so much freshwater, humanity nearly brought sea level rise to a halt."
Peaceray ( talk) 19:28, 24 August 2020 (UTC)
In case any of the page's owners care: The lede sentence "Between 1900 and 2016, the sea level rose by 16–21 cm (6.3–8.3 in) on average.[3]")\ makes it sound like sea level has risen 7 inches every year for over a century - i.e. over 70 feet. NASA says that about 7 inches is the TOTAL rise in that time frame, not the average.
https://climate.nasa.gov/news/3012/nasa-led-study-reveals-the-causes-of-sea-level-rise-since-1900/
If you mean something esoteric like "averaged out over the entire surface of the earth", you really need to explain it. In the absence of a qualifier, people will reasonably assume "on average" refers to "Between 1900 and 2016" (the most logical antecedent).
2603:3023:39F:B800:BC71:CBAC:1966:3810 (
talk)
10:16, 11 December 2020 (UTC)
I tried googling, but can't find anything. Thy, SvenAERTS ( talk) 13:24, 4 February 2021 (UTC)
Can some sections about coral dying due to ocean acidification and the "Third Pole" of the world (Tibet) melting be added? Also, I found something named floodmap.net while failing to find an interactive topographic map. It might warrant some reference. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 173.64.101.203 ( talk) 22:18, 21 February 2021 (UTC)
This might seem like an academic discussion but this article (like many others) uses ocean (singular) and oceans (plural) interchangeably. I am currently involved in a discussion about the three articles Ocean, Sea and World ocean. I feel that I need more eyes and brains to contribute to that brainstorming. Recently it has been discussed to change the wording in the ocean article mostly to oceans, and this could affect this "sea level rise" article as well. Anyhow, please contribute to the discussion here. Also let me know what you think about ocean versus oceans here. Or leave an opinion here. My own opinion is that ocean (singular) is fine when talking about sea level rise, rather than oceans. And that ocean and oceans is used interchangeably these days. But would be interested to know how others feel. EMsmile ( talk) 03:40, 4 March 2021 (UTC)
I would prefer if we could settle on just one image for the lead. Currently we have three. As per WP:MOSLEAD: "It is also common for the lead image to be representative because it provides a visual association for the topic, and allow readers to quickly assess if they have arrived at the right page". I think the first image might be the best one, as it's not overly complicated. The caption should probably include which year this graph is current for. EMsmile ( talk) 02:17, 10 March 2021 (UTC)
Hi @ Femkemilene! Per WP:SDFORMAT, we should be aiming for a target length of 40 characters or less. The current description is 87 characters, more than twice over that. I'll defer to your expertise about what word might be more appropriate than "ecological", but I don't think this is a page where it's necessary to go over the limit. Please keep in mind that short descriptions are intended to help with disambiguation, not to be a full mini-definition of the subject. Cheers, {{u| Sdkb}} talk 20:14, 11 June 2021 (UTC)
I suggest to remove the "further reading" list. If there is anything really important in there, it should be included as an in-line citation. EMsmile ( talk) 14:25, 29 April 2021 (UTC)
The Further reading section should not duplicate the content of the External links section, and should normally not duplicate the content of the References section, [...].
The Further reading section of an article contains a bulleted list of a reasonable number of works that a reader may consult for additional and more detailed coverage of the subject.I would advise all to read this essay, as many of the points it makes explain the reasons for maintaining a Further reading section in addition to the References & External links section.
{{Further reading cleanup}}
, a template that states Please ensure that only a reasonable number of balanced, topical, reliable, and notable further reading suggestions are given; removing less relevant or redundant publications with the same point of view where appropriate.Peaceray ( talk) 17:09, 31 May 2021 (UTC)
*Menefee, Samuel Pyeatt (1991).
"'Half Seas Over': The Impact of Sea Level Rise on International Law and Policy". UCLA Journal of Environmental Law and Policy. 9 (2).
* Warrick, R.A.; Provost, C.L.; Meier, M.F.; Oerlemans, J.; Woodworth, P.L. (1996).
"Changes in sea level". In Houghton, John Theodore (ed.). Climate Change 1995: The Science of Climate Change. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press. pp.
359–405.
ISBN
978-0-521-56436-6.
*Church, J. A.; Gregory, J. M.; Huybrechts, P.; Kuhn, M.; Lambeck, K.; Nhuan, M. T.; Qin, D.; Woodworth, P. L. (2001). "Changes in Sea Level". In Houghton, J.T; Ding, Y.; Griggs, D.J.; Noguer, M.; Van der Linden, P.J.; Dai, X.; Maskell, K.; Johnson, C.A. (eds.). Climate Change 2001: The Scientific Basis: Contribution of Working Group I to the Third Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel. pp. 640–694.
hdl:
10013/epic.15081.d001.
*
National Snow and Ice Data Center (February 19, 2018), "
Contribution of the Cryosphere to Changes in Sea Level". Accessed October 7, 2018
*
Maumoon Abdul Gayoom.
"Address by his Excellency Mr. Maumoon Abdul Gahoom, President of the Republic of Maldives, at the nineteenth special session of the United Nations General Assembly for the purpose of an overall review and appraisal of the implementation of agenda 21 – June 24, 1997". Archived from
the original on June 13, 2006. Retrieved 2006-01-06.
*Douglas, Bruce C. (July 1995).
"Global sea level change: Determination and interpretation". Reviews of Geophysics. 33 (S2): 1425–1432.
Bibcode:
1995RvGeo..33.1425D.
doi:
10.1029/95RG00355.
*Williams, Angela (October 2008). "Turning the Tide: Recognizing Climate Change Refugees in International Law". Law & Policy. 30 (4): 502–529.
doi:
10.1111/j.1467-9930.2008.00290.x.
S2CID
154078944.
EMsmile ( talk) 03:38, 1 June 2021 (UTC)
What were the changes between 1800-1917 and 1700-1817? 140.82.139.100 ( talk) 02:08, 6 January 2022 (UTC)
The following text block about sea level rise was recently deleted at effects of climate change by User:Chidgk1. It's been replaced with an excerpt from this article. I am just wondering if there was any content in this text block that would be worth salvaging? Probably not but I just thought I'd ask.
The IPCC's
Special Report on the Ocean and Cryosphere concluded that global mean sea level rose by 0.16 metres between 1901 and 2016.
[1] The rate of sea level rise since the industrial revolution in the 19th century has been larger than the rate during the previous two thousand years.
[2]
Global sea level rise is accelerating, rising 2.5 times faster between 2006 and 2016 than it did during the 20th century. [3] [4] Two main factors contribute to the rise. The first is thermal expansion: as ocean water warms, it expands. The second is from the melting of land-based ice in glaciers and ice sheets due to global warming. [5] Prior to 2007, thermal expansion was the largest component in these projections, contributing 70–75% of sea level rise. [6] As the impact of global warming has accelerated, melting from glaciers and ice sheets has become the main contributor. [7]
Even if emission of greenhouse gases stops overnight, sea level rise will continue for centuries to come. [8] In 2015, a study by Professor James Hansen of Columbia University and 16 other climate scientists said a sea level rise of three metres could be a reality by the end of the century. [9] Another study by scientists at the Royal Netherlands Meteorological Institute in 2017 using updated projections of Antarctic mass loss and a revised statistical method also concluded that, although it was a low probability, a three-metre rise was possible. [10] Rising sea levels will put hundreds of millions of people at risk in low-lying coastal areas in countries such as China, Bangladesh, India and Vietnam. [11] EMsmile ( talk) 09:04, 9 February 2022 (UTC)
References
I am just trying to reduce overlap for related articles: In the article Effects of climate change on oceans there is a section on sea level rise. I have now added an excerpt there but there is more content about sea level rise at that article which I would be inclined to move to here instead. I have not yet checked if it's good content and up to date. What do you think? Please check here and scroll below the excerpt part. EMsmile ( talk) 04:23, 18 August 2021 (UTC)
I noticed that a mix of spellings are used in this article, e.g. centimeters (American) and centimetres (English). I tried to figure out what the dominant language version is so far for this article but am not sure. The consensus is to be consistent and to not change from one language version to the other without reason. What would you say is currently the dominant version for this article? If nobody minds, then I would suggest to set is as British English. No particular reason other than that many articles in the the WikiProject Climate Change are in British English, such as climate change. Let's reach consensus on either version and then stick with it? EMsmile ( talk) 09:36, 9 May 2022 (UTC)
The article is peppered with inconsistent units or length, including millimetres, centimetres, inches, feet, etc. This is really messy and makes it unnecessarily inconvenient to compare numbers. It really should be cleaned up by standardising on units, to present information in a scientific and literate way. E.g. mms (the SI unit) could be used throughout and inches could be appended in parentheses. 86.143.2.1 ( talk) 08:36, 31 July 2021 (UTC)
This section could be improved by explaining sea-level changes at different geological timescales and the causes since the mid-pliocene using, e.g., the sea level section of the Paleoclimate report of the 5th Assessment report [1]. Goneri Le Cozannet ( talk) 08:32, 17 May 2022 (UTC)
References
I've just changed around the ordering of the sections. I think the order should be: what is it (current and predicted), what is causing it, how is it measured, what are the knock-on effects, how can we adapt to it, how could we prevent it or slow it down. While doing so, I felt that the section "what is it" was somehow lacking so I copied something from the lead. The "what is it" section should just state how much the sea level has risen so far since around 1850. We should make sure that we don't have content in the lead that is not in the main text (the lead is meant to be a summary of the article). EMsmile ( talk) 10:30, 17 May 2022 (UTC)
References
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If you zoom in on certain decades (like 1990-2010) observed changes are relatively linear (and there are oscillations with a period of a few years that make change harder to spot by eye). But zooming out, change is decidedly geometric since 1980s-era measurements started, and acceleration is both well-measured and reasonably well understood (e.g., where a majority of change comes from ice sheet melting, changes in albedo provide positive feedback).
The article should more clearly show the non-linear changes. Currently in a number of places it implies a linear progression and features data averaging annual changes over the past ~3 decades. We might find sources that clearly show that for a given scenario (say RCP 4.5 or 8.5) most of the SRL in the 21st century will come about in the last decade or two. (and may still be accelerating at that point). – SJ + 01:18, 4 July 2022 (UTC)
I think it would be good to have a section heading called "prevention". With most broad topics there are headings such as "components", "problems", "approaches", "policies", "costs" and also "prevention" etc. As a layperson I would look for "so how could sea level rise be prevented?". The sentence about that has now been moved to be inside of the adaptation section. But that's not where I would look for it in the TOC. Previously we had called it "Methods for slowing down sea level rise". I can see your point, User:Femkemilene, that that wasn't ideal (although I don't regard it as POV?). But perhaps a better solution could be found. That fact that it is NOT reversible might come to a shock to some but is an important piece of information. EMsmile ( talk) 21:53, 21 June 2022 (UTC)
Continued sea level rise ‘irreversible’ for centuries, says landmark UN climate report[2] or this one from The Guardian
We can’t stop rising sea levels, but we still have a chance to slow them down. [3] or this one from National Geographic:
Sea level will rise for centuries. We can control how much and how fast.[4].
A study published in 2017 concluded that Greenland's peripheral glaciers and ice caps crossed an irreversible tipping point around 1997, and will continue to meltand
Crossing such tipping points would mean that ice-sheet changes are potentially irreversible: a decrease to pre-industrial temperatures may not stabilize the ice sheet once the tipping point has been crossed. EMsmile ( talk) 20:46, 22 June 2022 (UTC)
References
I'd like to convert this article to long ref style to make it more consistent, easier to move content from one article to another, easier for newcomers. Also the long ref style works better when articles use excerpts from other articles. Does anyone object? I've just today made this conversion at ocean heat content, too. EMsmile ( talk) 11:45, 20 October 2022 (UTC)
The very first sentence of the article is currently like this "Tide gauge measurements show that the current global sea level rise began at the start of the 20th century." I suggest to change it to either: "The current global sea level rise began at the start of the 20th century. This observation is based on tide gauge measurements." or put the info about "tide gauge" in brackets at the end of the sentence or even omit it. I think it's not a critical piece of information that it would need to be the very first thing that a layperson reader sees. Non experts won't know what a "tide gauge" even is (it wasn't even wikilinked until now). The details of the measurements can come a little later. It's also not a word that non-English native speakers would be very familiar with. EMsmile ( talk) 08:49, 8 July 2022 (UTC)
Since about 1900, the sea level has risen worldwide at an average rate of 1–2 mm/yr (the global average sea level was about 15–25 cm higher in 2018 compared to 1900). [1]: 1318. This is the one I've just created at effects of climate change on oceans#Sea level rise. EMsmile ( talk) 11:48, 21 October 2022 (UTC)
Since about 1900, the sea level has risen worldwide at an average rate of 1–2 mm/yr (the global average sea level was about 15–25 cm higher in 2018 compared to 1900). [...] The rise is due to the net flux of heat into the surface of the land and oceans. The pace of sea level rise is now increasing: The sea level rose by about 4 mm per year from 2006 to 2018.And directly after that we talk about why that is a problem for humans. I think this ought to be already in the first para of sea level rise, too. Here it only comes in the third paragraph. We could e.g. swap the second with the third paragraph. And I'd be inclined to take out some of the American units to increase readability. Would this be feasible? Perhaps leave them only in 2 places, once for the mm figure and once for the cm figure? At the moment, the unit conversion is in 8 places in the lead which makes for very cumbersome reading. EMsmile ( talk) 23:24, 21 October 2022 (UTC)
This finding is based on many studies of coastal tide gauge records. The rise is due to the net flux of heat into the surface of the land and oceans.from the effects of climate change on oceans. They weren't added by me but are older and had somehow "survived" our recent review and improvement efforts of that article. EMsmile ( talk) 09:47, 22 October 2022 (UTC)
Globally, sea levels are now rising due to human-caused climate change, and this current global sea level rise (SLR) began at the start of the 20th century.(or is this too long, or should some key figures already be in the first sentence?). I had planned for more consensus to emerge before editing the lead but I see that User:InformationToKnowledge has dived in and has been bold so then I thought I might as well make this change, too, given that I first talked about it here on the talk page on 8 July. EMsmile ( talk) 22:26, 26 October 2022 (UTC)
Thanks! What part of the body supports the current second half of the sentence? Can't find it easily. If unsupported, we could leave it out.
Have you ever done WP:REDEX? It's a great set of exercises to write shorter and clearer sentences without losing any information, by avoiding redundancy. Femke (alt) ( talk) 11:37, 27 October 2022 (UTC)
References
Contrary to User:Femke's reversion [ [9]], causes and timeline are not "out of scope". Certainly, attributing cause to only climate change is a WP:NOV violation. Michaelmalak ( talk) 18:12, 19 December 2022 (UTC)
I am wondering if the current lead image is all that ideal (edit: the image that was used in the lead until 9 Jan 22 is now shown in the right side as the first image of this section). Why do we need an animation/video here, what value does it add? I find it a bit distracting. If the animation is showing something important that I missed then perhaps this could be clarified in the caption. Also the graph starts at 1992. Wouldn't it be better to have one that starts much earlier, maybe starting 1901? Maybe this chart ("Historical sea level reconstruction and projections up to 2100") that is currently further down would be more suitable for the lead (or is it too complex?). EMsmile ( talk) 10:51, 19 December 2022 (UTC)
References
EMsmile ( talk) 10:51, 19 December 2022 (UTC)
@ InformationToKnowledge: while I very much appreciate your updates and expansions, the article now stands at 12,771 words / 77k readable prose, which is about 4000 words longer than the ideal "maximum" ( WP:TOOBIG). Would you be willing to condense the article as well as expand? For instance, the lead needs to be around 500 words, and should not contain unique information. Alternatively, we could split and have an article about projections. —Femke 🐦 ( talk) 17:40, 8 January 2023 (UTC)
The following Wikimedia Commons file used on this page or its Wikidata item has been nominated for deletion:
Participate in the deletion discussion at the nomination page. — Community Tech bot ( talk) 10:38, 26 February 2023 (UTC)
The short description This article is about the current and projected rise in the world's average sea level from climate change. For sea level rise in general, see Past sea level.
. The focus of this article is affirmed by the lede which begins Between 1901 and 2018 …
.
Given that, IMO, this article should be named Sea level rise (current and projected) and Past sea level should be named Sea level rise.
I came to this article looking for general information on sea level rise and found the title very misleading in view of the content. I see there has been discussion around related issues in the archives, but the present state is, at minimum, incoherent. Humanengr ( talk) 18:00, 11 June 2023 (UTC)
The section on causes had the following sub-structure so far:
Ocean heating Antarctica Greenland Glaciers Land water storage
I have changed that now to this as something like "Greenland" is not an actual cause description (and it also makes it easier to jump directly to the section of interest from the table of content):
Ocean heating Changes of Antarctica's ice mass balance Greenland ice sheet melting Glaciers melting Sea ice melting Changes to land water storage
Did I get this right and do people agree with this? I wasn't sure about the Antarctica section as it's complicated. Therefore just "Antarctica melting" wouldn't be correct. Is "Changes of Antarctica's ice mass balance" is OK? Or "Changes to Antarctica's ice mass balance" is better? EMsmile ( talk) 12:44, 27 June 2023 (UTC)
This content in "Changes to land water storage" is not clear to me, could someone take a look and improve it for more clarity?:
"Humans impact how much water is stored on land. Building dams prevents large masses of water from flowing into the sea and therefore increases the storage of water on land. On the other hand, humans extract water from lakes, wetlands and underground reservoirs for food production leading to rising seas.
"
My questions: the building of dams just temporarily changes how much water flows to the ocean but not once the dam has operated for a while. Or are you referring to evaporation from the dam's surface? Also why does the extraction of water from lakes lead to rising sea levels? For extraction from groundwater I can imagine this but not from lakes? And aren't those amounts rather insignificant compared to the other process, i.e. melting and heating? EMsmile ( talk) 12:49, 27 June 2023 (UTC)
Human activity impacts how much water is stored on land. Dams retain large quantities of water, which is stored on land rather than flowing into the sea (even though the total quantity stored will vary somewhat from time to time). On the other hand, humans extract water from lakes, wetlands and underground reservoirs for food production, which may lead to rising seas.EMsmile ( talk) 08:36, 28 June 2023 (UTC)
Hello y'all. Thanks to all who have contributed so much interesting info to this article. Im planning to undertake a little copy edit run to see if the unsightly tag can be removed. I'll likely also do a little trimming. Much as I agree with ITK's arguments, the article does seem too long. No worries if anyone reverts these changes if they don't see them as improvements, especially the trimming, its always unpleasant to remove another editors work.
One change that I do think should remain at least in some form is the update concerning migration. Considering there's a strong possibility of climate migrations numbering between 0.5 – 1.5+ billion souls within the lifetimes of some here, the subject is a little under discussed in the sources. But in the specific case of SLR, António Guterres spoke about the risk of SLR alone impacting on almost a billion, causing mass migration on a "biblical scale". The good secretary general's warning was widely reported in the media, so does seem to warrant inclusion. FeydHuxtable ( talk) 15:14, 25 February 2023 (UTC)
So, at this point, we all seem to agree that the article is too large, right? I went for another attempt at condensing the article, and it did get slightly smaller - now at 10778 words. Still, according to Femke, this article needs to be at most exactly 10k words to qualify for Featured - so, we still essentially need trim a thousand words from somewhere to be in the running.
Looking at the recent revisions, I would say that an easy target is this edit by Datatada. No-one appears to have spotted it, but what those sentences describe are the consequences of climate change in general ("climatic shift") not sea level rise specifically. It's an easy choice to cut it, but shedding those 73 words only brings us ~10% closer to the goal.
Another choice which should be relatively easy is the last paragraph of Small Island States - the whole, "international mining conglomerates will move in once they are flooded" relies on a single Dutch-language from 1989 (that is, a year before the first IPCC report!) and considering the spotlight these nations have fought for in the recent summits, it's safe to assume it doesn't represent reality any longer unless proven otherwise. That sheds another 62 words, unless a more recent, credible source can be found which isn't contradicted by a better source.
Unfortunately, it seems like cutting the last ~600 words would require painful decreases of what seems like universally good and valuable data left. Moreover, it raises another question: with the article already past its suggested limits, what kind of material is valuable enough to include, and which one should be left out?
Some notable research/articles from this year, any and all of which may qualify for inclusion.
In all, thoughts? InformationToKnowledge ( talk) 17:28, 29 June 2023 (UTC)
Hello ITK, great to see you're possibly interested in elevating this article to FA class. If you’d like to trim the line with António Guterres's "biblical scale" quote from the article, I've no objection.
That said, the above arguments against the good secretary-general are not even wrong. I listened to the whole of his SLR address to the UN, that's why I came to this article in the first place. At no point did Guterres make a quantitative forecast on migration numbers. So there's no possibility of estimates from 2021 papers "being much lower than Guterres' claims". I'd guess the confusion may arise from various disengaged academics misunderstanding Guterres's metaphor when he said SLR might bring a 'torrent of trouble' to almost a billion people. 'Torrent of trouble' essentially meant disruption to their lives, not forced displacement for almost a billion! That would be ludicrous. It's important to understand that folk like Guterres are informed by the best available mainstream science, and are not going to make fringe claims. It may also be helpful to appreciate Guterres's target audience was UN delegates and other players involved in world governance. Those sort of folk are engaged with practical reality and can be relied on to hear his intended meaning. Granted, Guterres did speak of SLR threatening a mass exodus on a "biblical scale". But this is entirely inline with mainstream predictions. In biblical times, the earths' population was far lower than today. The dramatic wording connotes disasters affection entire peoples or nations as happened in various Bible stories - which is exactly the expected plight faced by various low lying island states. Changing track a bit, you might benefit from considering the economy of expression in Guterres's words, and how they compare with the long sentence on displacement Femke mentioned above, where the list of dry facts are boring even to an accomplished data scientist.
I see the 'Conversation' source suggests Guterres dramatic rhetoric might worsen anti-migrant sentiment. To clarify, Guterres is not an imbecile. He knows that. He's also in a position to judge the effect his words will have in inspiring action & weakening opposition across the worlds different political constituencies. Not to mention the effect on the political unconscious, and various non instrumental reasons like giving public recognition to the existential threat facing various marginalised peoples. When you hold an office like UN secretary-general, you can't always express yourself in flat, neutral language. Sometimes you have to take actions that are going to have mixed results. To do otherwise would be an abhorrent dereliction of duty. It's doubtful the mid rank academics who wrote that 'Conversation' piece are even capable of understanding such matters. The Conversation (website) is little more than a WP:RSOPINION expert blog in this context, not the sort of high quality WP:RS we'd want to set against someone like Guterres.
For future reference, if you come across an addition of mine you'd like to remove or change, you're welcome to simply go ahead and make the edit. See WP:Bebold. Unless perhaps it's a very major change, no need to start a talk page section, and definitely no need to ping me. Unless you want to of course. It's just there's a risk of setting me off if I read nonsense like in that source attempting to criticise the good secretary-general. Almost as annoying as seeing an editor trying to diss the Colonel! FeydHuxtable ( talk) 19:36, 3 July 2023 (UTC)
I've removed the strip chart because: I am not sure about this stripe chart, seems like the image was taken from a tweet - gets flagged up as unreliable. Also I think stripe charts work better with temperatures. But perhaps others love it? EMsmile ( talk) 07:20, 10 July 2023 (UTC)
References
This is an archive of past discussions. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page. |
Archive 1 | ← | Archive 4 | Archive 5 | Archive 6 |
The section on Antarctica states, "The Antarctic ice sheet mass balance is affected by snowfall accumulations, and ice discharge along the periphery. Under the influence of global warming, melt at the base of the ice sheet increases. Simultaneously, the capacity of the atmosphere to carry precipitation increases with temperature so that precipitation, in the form of snowfall, increases. Furthermore, the additional snowfall causes increased ice flow which leads to further loss of ice" - this is the conclusion from a 2012 reference, however, the paragraph is too vague, because it does not mention regional trends, article statements are too bold. prokaryotes ( talk) 17:11, 15 January 2019 (UTC)
I've now been able to look in detail to the news article [1] and the new Rignot paper [2] which you have cited.
You stated that
Could you confirm that this is what you meant? Are you now convinced about snowfall causing more ice flow? We could change the sentence about snowfall accumulation to something like: While snowfall has increased over the last 200 years, in recent decades (1979-2017) is has remained fairly stable. Would you agree with that? Is it sufficiently relevant? It is okay if I remove the sentence on East Antarctica losing mass till this in confirmed by other techniques OR independent scientist form a consensus on the accuracy of this new article? Femkemilene ( talk) 12:53, 20 January 2019 (UTC)
I disagree with the statement that it's pretty much consensus. Both the NASA study (covering 1/8) and the Rignot study use the 'contributions' methodology I think (described in Rignot), while satellite methodology is pointing towards a possible increase in mass [6]. The NASA study is also in agreement with the satellite study, which states: "The approximate state of balance of the wider EAIS suggests that the reported dynamic thinning of the Totten and Cook glaciers85,86 has been offset by accumulation gains elsewhere87." Concretely, I think it is fair to include the study but not as the ultimate truth. So adding possibly before East Antarctica under the Antarctica subheading and summarizing study in East Antarctica subsubsection. Femkemilene ( talk) 20:15, 20 January 2019 (UTC)
Will answer more of your message later. If you don't have access to a university VPN, it is a shame that only illegal sites such as Sci-Hub exist to get access to publicly paid-for research with publishers making insane profits. Femkemilene ( talk) 16:51, 21 January 2019 (UTC)
The article had a mechanism section at least in 2018. I find it confusing to have content about mechanisms in many places, such as the section on contributions. The latest IPCC AR5 goes into details about mechanism, section 13.4.3.2 Dynamical Change, noting,"Observations suggest three main mechanisms by which climate change can affect the dynamics of ice flow in Greenland (Sections 4.4.3 and 4.4.4): by directly affecting ice loss (outflow) through the calving of icebergs and marine melt from marine-terminating outlet glaciers; by altering basal sliding through the interaction of surface melt water with the glacier bed; and indirectly through the interaction between SMB and ice flow. We assess the consequences of each of these processes."
I was made to understood talk pages shouldn't have votes, but move towards consensus with argumentation. Reading subsubsections 4.4.3 and 4.4.4 it is very clear that IPCC puts mechanisms of ice melt under a section heading of contributions (specifically: Projected Contributions to Global Mean Sea Level). I really don't understand what you would put under a section heading of contributions, if not also the mechanisms involved in those contributions. We agree that mechanisms should be put in one place, but I see no reason to deviate from IPCC and not put them under the contribution section. Similarly, the NCA also does not make some weird distinction between a 'contribution' section and a 'mechanisms' section, but instead have one heading with "12.2: Physical Factors Contributing to Sea Level Rise". In terms of newer result, please don't put out of proportion attention to them. We are not a newspaper and typically don't need quotes unless they have historical significance. Femkemilene ( talk) 21:27, 16 January 2019 (UTC)
See WP:NOTVOTE NewsAndEventsGuy ( talk) 23:03, 16 January 2019 (UTC)
I will reply assuming that my interpretation of your text is correct.
Every inch a marathon. Let's back up. I am frustrated at the talk talk talk and still not being clear what P wants either. So to back up, F attempted to summarize P's proposal in three steps, saying
1. Have all mechanisms in one section and thereby merging the sections contributions and regional sea level
2. Change the name of the contribution section to dynamical changes OR change the (sub)section title mechanisms to dynamical changes.
3. (least clear to me) change subsectioning under the 'contributions' section, with at least one section 'dynamics' and possibly other sections as well.
It would help us all, P, if you simply focused and said "yes that's right" or "no, change this word and add this nuance". So for pity's sake let's just focus on the big picture summation without rehashing rearguing redefending reexplaining readvocating.... For right now, I'd simply like to know if F accurately summarized the big picture for your desired changes? Once we have all agreed on the statement of the proposal, then we can make progress discussing its pros and cons. NewsAndEventsGuy ( talk) 14:07, 17 January 2019 (UTC)
NewsAndEventsGuy ( talk) 14:50, 17 January 2019 (UTC)
If we include a new subsubsubheading, Processes, Physical processes or mechanisms would capture all processes you are referring to. I'm happy we've reached consensus on the meaning of dynamics. You have not given me an answer to my question what other things than physical processes you would like under the section heading Contribution. Is it the numbers of past and potential sea level rise? The IPCC has three subsections under their future contributions section for Greenland and Antarctica, ALL dealing with quantifying and describing physical processes. What else do you expect under contributions? Femkemilene ( talk) 08:46, 19 January 2019 (UTC)
Some of the findings reported therein are likely relevant to the article and should probably be noted. See:
Zazpot ( talk) 22:45, 28 March 2019 (UTC)
I'd like to float a rewrite for the first paragraph under "21st century projections". IPCC did not really provide an upper limit to projections and the main hedge (as in prior reports) was ice sheet dynamics. (For more background see this RealClimate 2013 blog post). To try to convey this in a smooth way, lets kick around something like this proposed substitute text (with citation polishing after we have consensus on the text)
Although improved understanding has allowed the projection of a likely range of sea level rise during the 21st century, it has not been possible to quantify a very likely range or give an upper bound to future rise. The potential collapse of ice shelves, as observed on the Antarctic Peninsula (Rignot et al., 2004; Scambos et al., 2004; Rott et al., 2011), could lead to a larger 21st century rise of up to several tenths of a metre.
— IPCC AR5 WG1
Your comments? NewsAndEventsGuy ( talk) 20:24, 30 July 2019 (UTC)
References
I don't claim the "Map of the Earth with a long-term 6-metre (20 ft) sea level rise" is completely incorrect and it states some of its limitation ("uniform distribution, actual sea level rise will vary regionally") but it has some glaring problems that make me question if it adds any informative value to the article.
The amount of red color seems to increase more by the length of the coastline under each pixel than the land area that would be inundated. If there is a lot of skerries, islands, bays or peninsulas within a pixel the area will glow bright red and makes it look lake it would become completely deluged. Norway for example has large areas in the north marked with red although those areas are very mountaineous and having peaks rising almost straight up from the sea. See for example this Google Streetview from Norway. Everything visible is marked with red in the map. Also, not taking glacial rebound into account adds another problem because it is countering the sea level rise around that area with about 100% margin at the moment. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 85.23.42.147 ( talk) 21:05, 22 September 2019 (UTC)
Here's the second paragraph of the lede as currently written:
For example, in 2007 the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) projected a high end estimate of 60 cm (2 ft) through 2099,[6] but their 2014 report raised the high-end estimate to about 90 cm (3 ft).[7] A number of later studies have concluded that a global sea level rise of 200 to 270 cm (6.6 to 8.9 ft) this century is "physically plausible".[8][3][9] A conservative estimate of the long-term projections is that each Celsius degree of temperature rise triggers a sea level rise of approximately 2.3 meters (4.2 ft/degree Fahrenheit) over a period of two millennia (2,000 years): an example of climate inertia.[2]
The century-end projections used here are the high-end estimates and the most extreme "physically plausible" projection. In the apparent interest of providing balance, the paragraph then switches to providing a low-end estimate, but it is projected over the next 2000 years rather than only to century's end. In the interest of giving users the most accurate information possible (in a consistent way), shouldn't the lede provide in all cases: (1) the point estimate, which is the single best estimate, or (2) the upper and lower confidence limit on the projections, or preferably (3) the point estimate & the CLs?
Ditto for the "Projections for the 21st century" section. Why are some paragraphs written to provide an estimate of "up to ..." or "as much as ..." or "physically possible", whereas others do in fact provide the point estimates and/or CLs (not just the most alarming plausible value)? Is there an objective reason for providing the most alarming as opposed to the least alarming plausible values here?
Should these sections be rewritten to be more informative, unbiased, and consistent? Bueller 007 ( talk) 23:41, 16 August 2020 (UTC)
Perhaps someone can weave the following sources into the article. Apparently during the 1970s, peak dam construction slowed sea-level rise drastically. As researcher Thomas Frederikse put it, "We impounded so much freshwater, humanity nearly brought sea level rise to a halt."
Peaceray ( talk) 19:28, 24 August 2020 (UTC)
In case any of the page's owners care: The lede sentence "Between 1900 and 2016, the sea level rose by 16–21 cm (6.3–8.3 in) on average.[3]")\ makes it sound like sea level has risen 7 inches every year for over a century - i.e. over 70 feet. NASA says that about 7 inches is the TOTAL rise in that time frame, not the average.
https://climate.nasa.gov/news/3012/nasa-led-study-reveals-the-causes-of-sea-level-rise-since-1900/
If you mean something esoteric like "averaged out over the entire surface of the earth", you really need to explain it. In the absence of a qualifier, people will reasonably assume "on average" refers to "Between 1900 and 2016" (the most logical antecedent).
2603:3023:39F:B800:BC71:CBAC:1966:3810 (
talk)
10:16, 11 December 2020 (UTC)
I tried googling, but can't find anything. Thy, SvenAERTS ( talk) 13:24, 4 February 2021 (UTC)
Can some sections about coral dying due to ocean acidification and the "Third Pole" of the world (Tibet) melting be added? Also, I found something named floodmap.net while failing to find an interactive topographic map. It might warrant some reference. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 173.64.101.203 ( talk) 22:18, 21 February 2021 (UTC)
This might seem like an academic discussion but this article (like many others) uses ocean (singular) and oceans (plural) interchangeably. I am currently involved in a discussion about the three articles Ocean, Sea and World ocean. I feel that I need more eyes and brains to contribute to that brainstorming. Recently it has been discussed to change the wording in the ocean article mostly to oceans, and this could affect this "sea level rise" article as well. Anyhow, please contribute to the discussion here. Also let me know what you think about ocean versus oceans here. Or leave an opinion here. My own opinion is that ocean (singular) is fine when talking about sea level rise, rather than oceans. And that ocean and oceans is used interchangeably these days. But would be interested to know how others feel. EMsmile ( talk) 03:40, 4 March 2021 (UTC)
I would prefer if we could settle on just one image for the lead. Currently we have three. As per WP:MOSLEAD: "It is also common for the lead image to be representative because it provides a visual association for the topic, and allow readers to quickly assess if they have arrived at the right page". I think the first image might be the best one, as it's not overly complicated. The caption should probably include which year this graph is current for. EMsmile ( talk) 02:17, 10 March 2021 (UTC)
Hi @ Femkemilene! Per WP:SDFORMAT, we should be aiming for a target length of 40 characters or less. The current description is 87 characters, more than twice over that. I'll defer to your expertise about what word might be more appropriate than "ecological", but I don't think this is a page where it's necessary to go over the limit. Please keep in mind that short descriptions are intended to help with disambiguation, not to be a full mini-definition of the subject. Cheers, {{u| Sdkb}} talk 20:14, 11 June 2021 (UTC)
I suggest to remove the "further reading" list. If there is anything really important in there, it should be included as an in-line citation. EMsmile ( talk) 14:25, 29 April 2021 (UTC)
The Further reading section should not duplicate the content of the External links section, and should normally not duplicate the content of the References section, [...].
The Further reading section of an article contains a bulleted list of a reasonable number of works that a reader may consult for additional and more detailed coverage of the subject.I would advise all to read this essay, as many of the points it makes explain the reasons for maintaining a Further reading section in addition to the References & External links section.
{{Further reading cleanup}}
, a template that states Please ensure that only a reasonable number of balanced, topical, reliable, and notable further reading suggestions are given; removing less relevant or redundant publications with the same point of view where appropriate.Peaceray ( talk) 17:09, 31 May 2021 (UTC)
*Menefee, Samuel Pyeatt (1991).
"'Half Seas Over': The Impact of Sea Level Rise on International Law and Policy". UCLA Journal of Environmental Law and Policy. 9 (2).
* Warrick, R.A.; Provost, C.L.; Meier, M.F.; Oerlemans, J.; Woodworth, P.L. (1996).
"Changes in sea level". In Houghton, John Theodore (ed.). Climate Change 1995: The Science of Climate Change. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press. pp.
359–405.
ISBN
978-0-521-56436-6.
*Church, J. A.; Gregory, J. M.; Huybrechts, P.; Kuhn, M.; Lambeck, K.; Nhuan, M. T.; Qin, D.; Woodworth, P. L. (2001). "Changes in Sea Level". In Houghton, J.T; Ding, Y.; Griggs, D.J.; Noguer, M.; Van der Linden, P.J.; Dai, X.; Maskell, K.; Johnson, C.A. (eds.). Climate Change 2001: The Scientific Basis: Contribution of Working Group I to the Third Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel. pp. 640–694.
hdl:
10013/epic.15081.d001.
*
National Snow and Ice Data Center (February 19, 2018), "
Contribution of the Cryosphere to Changes in Sea Level". Accessed October 7, 2018
*
Maumoon Abdul Gayoom.
"Address by his Excellency Mr. Maumoon Abdul Gahoom, President of the Republic of Maldives, at the nineteenth special session of the United Nations General Assembly for the purpose of an overall review and appraisal of the implementation of agenda 21 – June 24, 1997". Archived from
the original on June 13, 2006. Retrieved 2006-01-06.
*Douglas, Bruce C. (July 1995).
"Global sea level change: Determination and interpretation". Reviews of Geophysics. 33 (S2): 1425–1432.
Bibcode:
1995RvGeo..33.1425D.
doi:
10.1029/95RG00355.
*Williams, Angela (October 2008). "Turning the Tide: Recognizing Climate Change Refugees in International Law". Law & Policy. 30 (4): 502–529.
doi:
10.1111/j.1467-9930.2008.00290.x.
S2CID
154078944.
EMsmile ( talk) 03:38, 1 June 2021 (UTC)
What were the changes between 1800-1917 and 1700-1817? 140.82.139.100 ( talk) 02:08, 6 January 2022 (UTC)
The following text block about sea level rise was recently deleted at effects of climate change by User:Chidgk1. It's been replaced with an excerpt from this article. I am just wondering if there was any content in this text block that would be worth salvaging? Probably not but I just thought I'd ask.
The IPCC's
Special Report on the Ocean and Cryosphere concluded that global mean sea level rose by 0.16 metres between 1901 and 2016.
[1] The rate of sea level rise since the industrial revolution in the 19th century has been larger than the rate during the previous two thousand years.
[2]
Global sea level rise is accelerating, rising 2.5 times faster between 2006 and 2016 than it did during the 20th century. [3] [4] Two main factors contribute to the rise. The first is thermal expansion: as ocean water warms, it expands. The second is from the melting of land-based ice in glaciers and ice sheets due to global warming. [5] Prior to 2007, thermal expansion was the largest component in these projections, contributing 70–75% of sea level rise. [6] As the impact of global warming has accelerated, melting from glaciers and ice sheets has become the main contributor. [7]
Even if emission of greenhouse gases stops overnight, sea level rise will continue for centuries to come. [8] In 2015, a study by Professor James Hansen of Columbia University and 16 other climate scientists said a sea level rise of three metres could be a reality by the end of the century. [9] Another study by scientists at the Royal Netherlands Meteorological Institute in 2017 using updated projections of Antarctic mass loss and a revised statistical method also concluded that, although it was a low probability, a three-metre rise was possible. [10] Rising sea levels will put hundreds of millions of people at risk in low-lying coastal areas in countries such as China, Bangladesh, India and Vietnam. [11] EMsmile ( talk) 09:04, 9 February 2022 (UTC)
References
I am just trying to reduce overlap for related articles: In the article Effects of climate change on oceans there is a section on sea level rise. I have now added an excerpt there but there is more content about sea level rise at that article which I would be inclined to move to here instead. I have not yet checked if it's good content and up to date. What do you think? Please check here and scroll below the excerpt part. EMsmile ( talk) 04:23, 18 August 2021 (UTC)
I noticed that a mix of spellings are used in this article, e.g. centimeters (American) and centimetres (English). I tried to figure out what the dominant language version is so far for this article but am not sure. The consensus is to be consistent and to not change from one language version to the other without reason. What would you say is currently the dominant version for this article? If nobody minds, then I would suggest to set is as British English. No particular reason other than that many articles in the the WikiProject Climate Change are in British English, such as climate change. Let's reach consensus on either version and then stick with it? EMsmile ( talk) 09:36, 9 May 2022 (UTC)
The article is peppered with inconsistent units or length, including millimetres, centimetres, inches, feet, etc. This is really messy and makes it unnecessarily inconvenient to compare numbers. It really should be cleaned up by standardising on units, to present information in a scientific and literate way. E.g. mms (the SI unit) could be used throughout and inches could be appended in parentheses. 86.143.2.1 ( talk) 08:36, 31 July 2021 (UTC)
This section could be improved by explaining sea-level changes at different geological timescales and the causes since the mid-pliocene using, e.g., the sea level section of the Paleoclimate report of the 5th Assessment report [1]. Goneri Le Cozannet ( talk) 08:32, 17 May 2022 (UTC)
References
I've just changed around the ordering of the sections. I think the order should be: what is it (current and predicted), what is causing it, how is it measured, what are the knock-on effects, how can we adapt to it, how could we prevent it or slow it down. While doing so, I felt that the section "what is it" was somehow lacking so I copied something from the lead. The "what is it" section should just state how much the sea level has risen so far since around 1850. We should make sure that we don't have content in the lead that is not in the main text (the lead is meant to be a summary of the article). EMsmile ( talk) 10:30, 17 May 2022 (UTC)
References
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If you zoom in on certain decades (like 1990-2010) observed changes are relatively linear (and there are oscillations with a period of a few years that make change harder to spot by eye). But zooming out, change is decidedly geometric since 1980s-era measurements started, and acceleration is both well-measured and reasonably well understood (e.g., where a majority of change comes from ice sheet melting, changes in albedo provide positive feedback).
The article should more clearly show the non-linear changes. Currently in a number of places it implies a linear progression and features data averaging annual changes over the past ~3 decades. We might find sources that clearly show that for a given scenario (say RCP 4.5 or 8.5) most of the SRL in the 21st century will come about in the last decade or two. (and may still be accelerating at that point). – SJ + 01:18, 4 July 2022 (UTC)
I think it would be good to have a section heading called "prevention". With most broad topics there are headings such as "components", "problems", "approaches", "policies", "costs" and also "prevention" etc. As a layperson I would look for "so how could sea level rise be prevented?". The sentence about that has now been moved to be inside of the adaptation section. But that's not where I would look for it in the TOC. Previously we had called it "Methods for slowing down sea level rise". I can see your point, User:Femkemilene, that that wasn't ideal (although I don't regard it as POV?). But perhaps a better solution could be found. That fact that it is NOT reversible might come to a shock to some but is an important piece of information. EMsmile ( talk) 21:53, 21 June 2022 (UTC)
Continued sea level rise ‘irreversible’ for centuries, says landmark UN climate report[2] or this one from The Guardian
We can’t stop rising sea levels, but we still have a chance to slow them down. [3] or this one from National Geographic:
Sea level will rise for centuries. We can control how much and how fast.[4].
A study published in 2017 concluded that Greenland's peripheral glaciers and ice caps crossed an irreversible tipping point around 1997, and will continue to meltand
Crossing such tipping points would mean that ice-sheet changes are potentially irreversible: a decrease to pre-industrial temperatures may not stabilize the ice sheet once the tipping point has been crossed. EMsmile ( talk) 20:46, 22 June 2022 (UTC)
References
I'd like to convert this article to long ref style to make it more consistent, easier to move content from one article to another, easier for newcomers. Also the long ref style works better when articles use excerpts from other articles. Does anyone object? I've just today made this conversion at ocean heat content, too. EMsmile ( talk) 11:45, 20 October 2022 (UTC)
The very first sentence of the article is currently like this "Tide gauge measurements show that the current global sea level rise began at the start of the 20th century." I suggest to change it to either: "The current global sea level rise began at the start of the 20th century. This observation is based on tide gauge measurements." or put the info about "tide gauge" in brackets at the end of the sentence or even omit it. I think it's not a critical piece of information that it would need to be the very first thing that a layperson reader sees. Non experts won't know what a "tide gauge" even is (it wasn't even wikilinked until now). The details of the measurements can come a little later. It's also not a word that non-English native speakers would be very familiar with. EMsmile ( talk) 08:49, 8 July 2022 (UTC)
Since about 1900, the sea level has risen worldwide at an average rate of 1–2 mm/yr (the global average sea level was about 15–25 cm higher in 2018 compared to 1900). [1]: 1318. This is the one I've just created at effects of climate change on oceans#Sea level rise. EMsmile ( talk) 11:48, 21 October 2022 (UTC)
Since about 1900, the sea level has risen worldwide at an average rate of 1–2 mm/yr (the global average sea level was about 15–25 cm higher in 2018 compared to 1900). [...] The rise is due to the net flux of heat into the surface of the land and oceans. The pace of sea level rise is now increasing: The sea level rose by about 4 mm per year from 2006 to 2018.And directly after that we talk about why that is a problem for humans. I think this ought to be already in the first para of sea level rise, too. Here it only comes in the third paragraph. We could e.g. swap the second with the third paragraph. And I'd be inclined to take out some of the American units to increase readability. Would this be feasible? Perhaps leave them only in 2 places, once for the mm figure and once for the cm figure? At the moment, the unit conversion is in 8 places in the lead which makes for very cumbersome reading. EMsmile ( talk) 23:24, 21 October 2022 (UTC)
This finding is based on many studies of coastal tide gauge records. The rise is due to the net flux of heat into the surface of the land and oceans.from the effects of climate change on oceans. They weren't added by me but are older and had somehow "survived" our recent review and improvement efforts of that article. EMsmile ( talk) 09:47, 22 October 2022 (UTC)
Globally, sea levels are now rising due to human-caused climate change, and this current global sea level rise (SLR) began at the start of the 20th century.(or is this too long, or should some key figures already be in the first sentence?). I had planned for more consensus to emerge before editing the lead but I see that User:InformationToKnowledge has dived in and has been bold so then I thought I might as well make this change, too, given that I first talked about it here on the talk page on 8 July. EMsmile ( talk) 22:26, 26 October 2022 (UTC)
Thanks! What part of the body supports the current second half of the sentence? Can't find it easily. If unsupported, we could leave it out.
Have you ever done WP:REDEX? It's a great set of exercises to write shorter and clearer sentences without losing any information, by avoiding redundancy. Femke (alt) ( talk) 11:37, 27 October 2022 (UTC)
References
Contrary to User:Femke's reversion [ [9]], causes and timeline are not "out of scope". Certainly, attributing cause to only climate change is a WP:NOV violation. Michaelmalak ( talk) 18:12, 19 December 2022 (UTC)
I am wondering if the current lead image is all that ideal (edit: the image that was used in the lead until 9 Jan 22 is now shown in the right side as the first image of this section). Why do we need an animation/video here, what value does it add? I find it a bit distracting. If the animation is showing something important that I missed then perhaps this could be clarified in the caption. Also the graph starts at 1992. Wouldn't it be better to have one that starts much earlier, maybe starting 1901? Maybe this chart ("Historical sea level reconstruction and projections up to 2100") that is currently further down would be more suitable for the lead (or is it too complex?). EMsmile ( talk) 10:51, 19 December 2022 (UTC)
References
EMsmile ( talk) 10:51, 19 December 2022 (UTC)
@ InformationToKnowledge: while I very much appreciate your updates and expansions, the article now stands at 12,771 words / 77k readable prose, which is about 4000 words longer than the ideal "maximum" ( WP:TOOBIG). Would you be willing to condense the article as well as expand? For instance, the lead needs to be around 500 words, and should not contain unique information. Alternatively, we could split and have an article about projections. —Femke 🐦 ( talk) 17:40, 8 January 2023 (UTC)
The following Wikimedia Commons file used on this page or its Wikidata item has been nominated for deletion:
Participate in the deletion discussion at the nomination page. — Community Tech bot ( talk) 10:38, 26 February 2023 (UTC)
The short description This article is about the current and projected rise in the world's average sea level from climate change. For sea level rise in general, see Past sea level.
. The focus of this article is affirmed by the lede which begins Between 1901 and 2018 …
.
Given that, IMO, this article should be named Sea level rise (current and projected) and Past sea level should be named Sea level rise.
I came to this article looking for general information on sea level rise and found the title very misleading in view of the content. I see there has been discussion around related issues in the archives, but the present state is, at minimum, incoherent. Humanengr ( talk) 18:00, 11 June 2023 (UTC)
The section on causes had the following sub-structure so far:
Ocean heating Antarctica Greenland Glaciers Land water storage
I have changed that now to this as something like "Greenland" is not an actual cause description (and it also makes it easier to jump directly to the section of interest from the table of content):
Ocean heating Changes of Antarctica's ice mass balance Greenland ice sheet melting Glaciers melting Sea ice melting Changes to land water storage
Did I get this right and do people agree with this? I wasn't sure about the Antarctica section as it's complicated. Therefore just "Antarctica melting" wouldn't be correct. Is "Changes of Antarctica's ice mass balance" is OK? Or "Changes to Antarctica's ice mass balance" is better? EMsmile ( talk) 12:44, 27 June 2023 (UTC)
This content in "Changes to land water storage" is not clear to me, could someone take a look and improve it for more clarity?:
"Humans impact how much water is stored on land. Building dams prevents large masses of water from flowing into the sea and therefore increases the storage of water on land. On the other hand, humans extract water from lakes, wetlands and underground reservoirs for food production leading to rising seas.
"
My questions: the building of dams just temporarily changes how much water flows to the ocean but not once the dam has operated for a while. Or are you referring to evaporation from the dam's surface? Also why does the extraction of water from lakes lead to rising sea levels? For extraction from groundwater I can imagine this but not from lakes? And aren't those amounts rather insignificant compared to the other process, i.e. melting and heating? EMsmile ( talk) 12:49, 27 June 2023 (UTC)
Human activity impacts how much water is stored on land. Dams retain large quantities of water, which is stored on land rather than flowing into the sea (even though the total quantity stored will vary somewhat from time to time). On the other hand, humans extract water from lakes, wetlands and underground reservoirs for food production, which may lead to rising seas.EMsmile ( talk) 08:36, 28 June 2023 (UTC)
Hello y'all. Thanks to all who have contributed so much interesting info to this article. Im planning to undertake a little copy edit run to see if the unsightly tag can be removed. I'll likely also do a little trimming. Much as I agree with ITK's arguments, the article does seem too long. No worries if anyone reverts these changes if they don't see them as improvements, especially the trimming, its always unpleasant to remove another editors work.
One change that I do think should remain at least in some form is the update concerning migration. Considering there's a strong possibility of climate migrations numbering between 0.5 – 1.5+ billion souls within the lifetimes of some here, the subject is a little under discussed in the sources. But in the specific case of SLR, António Guterres spoke about the risk of SLR alone impacting on almost a billion, causing mass migration on a "biblical scale". The good secretary general's warning was widely reported in the media, so does seem to warrant inclusion. FeydHuxtable ( talk) 15:14, 25 February 2023 (UTC)
So, at this point, we all seem to agree that the article is too large, right? I went for another attempt at condensing the article, and it did get slightly smaller - now at 10778 words. Still, according to Femke, this article needs to be at most exactly 10k words to qualify for Featured - so, we still essentially need trim a thousand words from somewhere to be in the running.
Looking at the recent revisions, I would say that an easy target is this edit by Datatada. No-one appears to have spotted it, but what those sentences describe are the consequences of climate change in general ("climatic shift") not sea level rise specifically. It's an easy choice to cut it, but shedding those 73 words only brings us ~10% closer to the goal.
Another choice which should be relatively easy is the last paragraph of Small Island States - the whole, "international mining conglomerates will move in once they are flooded" relies on a single Dutch-language from 1989 (that is, a year before the first IPCC report!) and considering the spotlight these nations have fought for in the recent summits, it's safe to assume it doesn't represent reality any longer unless proven otherwise. That sheds another 62 words, unless a more recent, credible source can be found which isn't contradicted by a better source.
Unfortunately, it seems like cutting the last ~600 words would require painful decreases of what seems like universally good and valuable data left. Moreover, it raises another question: with the article already past its suggested limits, what kind of material is valuable enough to include, and which one should be left out?
Some notable research/articles from this year, any and all of which may qualify for inclusion.
In all, thoughts? InformationToKnowledge ( talk) 17:28, 29 June 2023 (UTC)
Hello ITK, great to see you're possibly interested in elevating this article to FA class. If you’d like to trim the line with António Guterres's "biblical scale" quote from the article, I've no objection.
That said, the above arguments against the good secretary-general are not even wrong. I listened to the whole of his SLR address to the UN, that's why I came to this article in the first place. At no point did Guterres make a quantitative forecast on migration numbers. So there's no possibility of estimates from 2021 papers "being much lower than Guterres' claims". I'd guess the confusion may arise from various disengaged academics misunderstanding Guterres's metaphor when he said SLR might bring a 'torrent of trouble' to almost a billion people. 'Torrent of trouble' essentially meant disruption to their lives, not forced displacement for almost a billion! That would be ludicrous. It's important to understand that folk like Guterres are informed by the best available mainstream science, and are not going to make fringe claims. It may also be helpful to appreciate Guterres's target audience was UN delegates and other players involved in world governance. Those sort of folk are engaged with practical reality and can be relied on to hear his intended meaning. Granted, Guterres did speak of SLR threatening a mass exodus on a "biblical scale". But this is entirely inline with mainstream predictions. In biblical times, the earths' population was far lower than today. The dramatic wording connotes disasters affection entire peoples or nations as happened in various Bible stories - which is exactly the expected plight faced by various low lying island states. Changing track a bit, you might benefit from considering the economy of expression in Guterres's words, and how they compare with the long sentence on displacement Femke mentioned above, where the list of dry facts are boring even to an accomplished data scientist.
I see the 'Conversation' source suggests Guterres dramatic rhetoric might worsen anti-migrant sentiment. To clarify, Guterres is not an imbecile. He knows that. He's also in a position to judge the effect his words will have in inspiring action & weakening opposition across the worlds different political constituencies. Not to mention the effect on the political unconscious, and various non instrumental reasons like giving public recognition to the existential threat facing various marginalised peoples. When you hold an office like UN secretary-general, you can't always express yourself in flat, neutral language. Sometimes you have to take actions that are going to have mixed results. To do otherwise would be an abhorrent dereliction of duty. It's doubtful the mid rank academics who wrote that 'Conversation' piece are even capable of understanding such matters. The Conversation (website) is little more than a WP:RSOPINION expert blog in this context, not the sort of high quality WP:RS we'd want to set against someone like Guterres.
For future reference, if you come across an addition of mine you'd like to remove or change, you're welcome to simply go ahead and make the edit. See WP:Bebold. Unless perhaps it's a very major change, no need to start a talk page section, and definitely no need to ping me. Unless you want to of course. It's just there's a risk of setting me off if I read nonsense like in that source attempting to criticise the good secretary-general. Almost as annoying as seeing an editor trying to diss the Colonel! FeydHuxtable ( talk) 19:36, 3 July 2023 (UTC)
I've removed the strip chart because: I am not sure about this stripe chart, seems like the image was taken from a tweet - gets flagged up as unreliable. Also I think stripe charts work better with temperatures. But perhaps others love it? EMsmile ( talk) 07:20, 10 July 2023 (UTC)
References