Scientific Reports (Jul 2017)

A global classification of coastal flood hazard climates associated with large-scale oceanographic forcing

  • Ana Rueda,
  • Sean Vitousek,
  • Paula Camus,
  • Antonio Tomás,
  • Antonio Espejo,
  • Inigo J. Losada,
  • Patrick L. Barnard,
  • Li H. Erikson,
  • Peter Ruggiero,
  • Borja G. Reguero,
  • Fernando J. Mendez

DOI
https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-017-05090-w
Journal volume & issue
Vol. 7, no. 1
pp. 1 – 8

Abstract

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Abstract Coastal communities throughout the world are exposed to numerous and increasing threats, such as coastal flooding and erosion, saltwater intrusion and wetland degradation. Here, we present the first global-scale analysis of the main drivers of coastal flooding due to large-scale oceanographic factors. Given the large dimensionality of the problem (e.g. spatiotemporal variability in flood magnitude and the relative influence of waves, tides and surge levels), we have performed a computer-based classification to identify geographical areas with homogeneous climates. Results show that 75% of coastal regions around the globe have the potential for very large flooding events with low probabilities (unbounded tails), 82% are tide-dominated, and almost 49% are highly susceptible to increases in flooding frequency due to sea-level rise.