Skip to main content
Welcome to GCOS
GCOS Slogan

Main navigation

  • Home
  • About
  • ECV
    • Essential Climate Variables
    • ECV Review
    • About Essential Climate Variables
  • Expert Panels
    • Atmospheric Observation Panel for Climate
    • Ocean Observations Physics and Climate Panel
    • Terrestrial Observation Panel for Climate
    • Joint Panels Meeting 2019
    • Joint Panels Meeting 2021
  • Cooperation
    • Cooperation Mechanism
    • Regional Workshops
    • National Cooperations
    • CBS Lead Centres for GCOS
  • Indicators
  • News
  • Networks
  • GCOS Goes Green
  • Publications
    • GCOS Implementation Plan 2022
    • GCOS Implementation Plan 2016
    • GCOS Status Report 2021
    • Publications and Outreach
  1. Home
  2. Essential Climate Variables
  3. Sea Level

 

Sea Level

Sea Level is one of the primary indicators of global climate change. Change in the global mean sea level provides a measure of the net change in ocean mass due to melting of glaciers and ice sheets, and net change in ocean volume due to thermal expansion. Sea level observations characterize inter-seasonal variability such as ENSO. On the regional scales, changes in sea level can be far larger than the globally averaged value due to changes in temperature, salinity and circulation. Along many continental margins vertical land displacement associated with crustal adjustments to past and current land ice melt also cause regional variations in apparent sea level independent of the ocean. Coastal sea level change is a major driver of societal impacts.
  Domain: Ocean
  Subdomain: Physical
  Scientific Area: Physical Properties
  ECV Steward: Peter Oke
  Products:  Regional Mean Sea Level; Global Mean Sea Level

 


Sea Level Rise Map and Global Trend

Figure 1: Combined map of regional patterns of observed sea level (in mm/year). This map can be obtained using gridded, multi-mission Ssalto/Duacs data since 1993, which enable the local slopes to be estimated with a very high resolution (1/4 of a degree on a Cartesian projection). Isolated variations in MSL are thus revealed, mainly in the major ocean currents and ENSO events (Credits EU Copernicus Marine Service, CLS, Cnes, Legos).

Source: https://www.aviso.altimetry.fr/en/data/products/ocean-indicators-produc…

 


ECV Products and Requirements

These products and requirements reflect the Implementation Plan 2022 (GCOS-244).

The requirements are found in the complete 2022 ECVs Requirements document as well: ECV Sea Level.

Products   Regional Mean Sea Level     Global Mean Sea Level
  (*) Unit Values   Unit Values
Horizontal Resolution G km 10   km 10
B      
T 100   100
Vertical Resolution G   -     -
B -   -
T -   -
Temporal Resolution G d 1   d 1
B      
T 7   30
Timeliness G month 1   d 30
B      
T 12   365
Required Measurement Uncertainty (2-sigma) G mm     mm  
B      
T 10   2-4
Stability G mm yr-1 0.3   mm yr-1 <0.03
B     <0.1
T <0.1   <0.3

 

(*) Goal (G): an ideal requirement above which further improvements are not necessary. Breakthrough (B): an intermediate level between threshold and goal which, if achieved, would result in a significant improvement for the targeted application. The breakthrough value may also indicate the level at which specified uses within climate monitoring become possible. It may be appropriate to have different breakthrough values for different uses. Threshold (T): the minimum requirement to be met to ensure that data are useful


Data Sources

This list provides sources for openly accessible data sets with worldwide coverage for which metadata is available. It is curated by the respective GCOS ECV Steward(s). The list does not claim to be complete. Anyone with a suitable dataset who wishes it to be added to this list should contact the GCOS Secretariat.

In Situ

  • GLOSS - Global Sea-Level Observing System

http://www.gloss-sealevel.org/data/
 

Satellite:

  • ECV Inventory by the CEOS/CGMS Working Group on Climate (WGclimate)

http://climatemonitoring.info/ecvinventory

  • Aviso

https://www.aviso.altimetry.fr/en/data/products/sea-surface-height-prod…

  • JPL PODAAC

 https://podaac.jpl.nasa.gov/OceanSurfaceTopography

EU Copernicus

 

Sponsors

Twitter icon



Copyright | Privacy | Contact