ATCM IP184 Understanding Future Sea-level Change Around Antarctica

<p>This paper updates key information presented in ATCM XLV IP095 <em>Understanding Future Sea-Level Change Around Antarctica</em> and reiterates COMNAP, SCAR and WMO advice for consideration by the ATCM and CEP on the importance of closing knowledge gaps in support of development of robust management and policy-making decisions into the future as outlined in the SCAR Antarctic Climate Change and the Environment (ACCE) Decadal Synopsis Report (Chown et al., 2022). This work is also directly relevant to the CEP Climate Change Response Work Programme (CCRWP). </p> <p>For Antarctica, studies show the rates and patterns of sea level change will be complex, and their accurate prediction for specific locations is challenging. Lack of data and information on climate change impacts in general, and sea-level rise specifically, is concerning. We therefore advise that Parties should support their National Antarctic Programmes to:</p> <p> </p> <p>·         extend the current critical observational infrastructure – especially the network of long-term continuous geodetic observations (GPS) and tide gauges that provide location-specific time-series of changes in land elevation and sea level;</p> <p>·         facilitate research to improve projections of Antarctic ice mass loss and its regional variability; </p> <p>·         monitor local sea-level and land elevation near identified coastal hazards;</p> <p>·         identify risk and to adapt with urgency to impacts that are now unavoidable; and</p> <p>·         adopt a dynamic decision-making approach that provides resilience in response to those unavoidable impacts and that can be updated and modified as new information evolves. This dynamic approach is key because sea-level projections are uncertain, especially beyond 2060–2070.</p> <p> </p>