Anthropogenic change

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• Impact of Artificial Reservoir Water Impoundment on Global Sea Level

  • B. F. Chao, Y. H. Wu, Y. S. Li,
  • Original article citation: Science doi:10.1126/science.1154580 (2008)
  • Categories: Anthropogenic change and Ocean Sciences
  • Recommended by: Anna Barnett on 03/27/2008 05:44PM GMT
  • Reasons for recommending:
    I wrote up this paper - the first detailed tally of water locked up behind dams during the 20th century, with some surprising implications for global sea level rise - as a Research Highlight in NRCC this week (http://www.nature.com/climate/2008/0804/full/climate.2008.27.html). The lead author told me that the IPCC already was not quite able to account for observed sea level rise in terms of thermal expansion of warming surface water, ice melt, and other known sources of increasing ocean volume. Adding up these sources still left a slight gap in the budget. Now, with the finding that damming has prevented 3 cm of rise, the gap is even larger. Something must have made up for the water removed into reservoirs - but what? And on another note, what do you make of the way the sea level rise flattens to a constant rate for the last 80 years when the stored water is added back?