Reconstruction of Mediterranean sea-level changes and contributions for 1960-2018

Data supporting the paper:

Calafat, F. M., Frederikse, T., and Horsburgh, K. (2022). The Sources of Sea-Level Changes in the Mediterranean Sea since 1960, Journal of Geophysical Research Oceans, under review.

Please cite the paper above when using this data set.

This new version of the data set has been published to support the paper above and includes more data than the previous version as well as several improvements and refinements. Version 2.2 has been created to include estimates of rates due to the inverse barometer effect.

Data description:

• Bayesian_estimates_Mediterranean_sea_level.nc: this file contains gridded estimates of relative sea-level changes and their instantaneous rates for 1960-2018 in the Mediterranean Sea, separated into the individual contributions of:
  1. Sterodynamic changes (i.e., ocean dynamics and thermal expansion).
  2. Contemporary GRD (i.e., changes in Earth gravity, Earth rotation, and solid-earth deformation due to land-mass changes).
  3. GIA (i.e., glacial isostatic adjustment).
  4. Short-term variability (interannual to decadal). 
  5. Inverse barometer effect.
• data_input.mat: this file contains all of the data needed to run the Bayesian hierarchical model. This includes the observational data from tide gauges and satellite altimetry as well as the ensemble-mean and ensemble covariance matrices for the sea-level fingerprints associated with contemporary GRD effects and GIA.

The Bayesian estimates have been obtained using a spatiotemporal Bayesian hierarchical model (see paper). This work has been carried out within the framework of the EuroSea project funded by European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under grant agreement No 862626.