Sea-level projections representing the deeply uncertain contribution of the West Antarctic ice sheet.

ABSTRACT: There is a growing awareness that uncertainties surrounding future sea-level projections may be much larger than typically perceived. Recently published projections appear widely divergent and highly sensitive to non-trivial model choices_. Moreover, the West Antarctic ice sheet (WAIS) may be much less stable than previous believed, enabling a rapid disintegration. Here, we present a set of probabilistic sea-level projections that approximates the deeply uncertain WAIS contributions. The projections aim to inform robust decisions by clarifying the sensitivity to non-trivial or controversial assumptions. We show that the deeply uncertain WAIS contribution can dominate other uncertainties within decades. These deep uncertainties call for the development of robust adaptive strategie

SUBMITTER: Bakker AMR 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC5478629 | biostudies-literature | 2017 Jun

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature