Many Australians are fearful of catastrophic human-caused climate change because this is what the state-sponsored propaganda on the Australian Broadcasting Corporation (the ABC) tells us.
In Australia, we mostly live near the sea. All along our coastline there is evidence of sea level fall, yes fall.*
Where is the evidence for rising sea levels?
Will you see how much sea levels have risen when you watch the fireworks over the Opera House in Sydney Harbour this New Year's Eve — or will you see evidence of sea level fall?
It is that time of year when family and friends visit me at the beach. My niece told me just before Christmas that she had read so many of the comments at the YouTube thread following my first short film 'Beige Reef’. She was surprised at how many comments there were — an awful lot she commented.
When I asked her what she thought of the film, she told me that she had not actually watched the film.
At that morning tea, under a shelter at Coolum Beach, none of my nieces or nephews or older brother could admit to having watched the film.
It is all of 12 minutes long.
This first film involved me wading into, and diving below, waters that my sister-in-law some weeks earlier had indicated put me at risk of a shark attack. But still she has not actually watched the film.
I know that there is fear within the varies communities within which I exist, of at least three things: sharks, catastrophic human-caused global warming — and that I could lead some of them down the path of global warming scepticism and from this they could end-up pariahs.
I diverge.
The best evidence is that global sea level has fallen by at least 2 metres since the the Holocene high stand about 4,000 BC; that is about 6,0000 years ago, a time known as the Minoan warm period.
The evidence in rocks and cliff faces all along the Australian east coast is that sea level was about 1m higher in the Roman warm period (year 0), and about 0.5m higher in the Medieval warm period (1,000 AD).
Conversely, it is believed the sea level was lower in the cold periods of 500 AD (Dark Ages) and the Little Ice Age (1,650 AD), maybe both 0.2 — 0.5 metres below today’s level. This last low sea level is particularly important, because it from this base sea levels are perhaps still rising back to average Holocene levels. But are they really?
When I go kayaking, and walk along the sea shore, and send my drone Skido up into the sky and look down and take pictures of things like marine potholes that feature at the top of this blog post: I see evidence for a sea shore that is receding.
The sea begins at the land’s edge. Where the sea begins is the ‘sea level’.
When I stand beside the circular pothole that you can see in the centre of the picture accompanying this blog post (... scroll to the very top).
I’m standing on a wave-cut platform of sandstone bedrock with rectangular fractures, and red iron oxide colouring.
Potholes are formed by the relentless grinding of harder rocks — perhaps granite— caught in a depression in this softer sandstone. Pounding surf causes the harder rocks to swirl — round and round — grinding down.
The grinding that created these potholes could only have happened when sea levels were higher, when this platform was between the high and low tide marks.
I took the picture on a highest tide this last year, in 2019. A year that is nearly over.
Sea levels must have been higher in the past. Because even on the highest tides this last year, the waves never reached this far?
The ABC may be concerned about rising sea levels, but where is your evidence for it? Are you brave enough, do you care enough, can you find the time enough, to think through some of these issues this next year: in 2020?
We are all entitled to our own opinions, but not our own facts.
I photographed this cliff face just to the north-west of the pot holes, which is just to the north-west of my favourite beach in Noosa National Park, so near where I live. What can you see in this landscape? Is there a wave cut platform, and what might have created it? Have you seen similar along other sections of sea shore?
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* This is intended as the first of a series of blog posts on sea level change.
Hi Peter
My position is that there are many different phenomena that affect sea level, most of them extraterrestrial in origin.
The longer-term most significant trend obvious in the cliff faces and wave cut platforms along the shore line here at Noosa indicate sea level fall of more than one metre since the Holocene High Stand. That there has been a rise of perhaps 36 cms since the early 1800s, coincident with the Industrial revolution, is not particularly remarkable and does not change the fact that the longer term trend is one of fall.
It is also the case that there will be a measurable rise in the sea level at Noosa of about 80 cms tomorrow between 6am and lunch time, followed by a fall of a similar amount. This is part of the daily cycle that sits within the monthly cycle that sits within the 18.6 year lunar declination cycle, and so it goes on.
Can you tell me what caused the 120 metre rise in sea levels globally that began about 20,000 years ago and continued until about 7,000 years ago?
Many sceptics and alarmists like to suggest that sea levels have continue to rise through the Holocene (over the last 10,000 years) but this claim is not supported by the technical literature or what I can see along the east coast of Australia.
There are cycles within cycles, I think the fall since the Holocene high stand the most significant for those interested in climate change, and the most denied ... but if you are going fishing it is the daily cycle that will be of most concern to you, perhaps.
The 2016 Donchyts et al study found that since the 1980s coastal land was increasing all around the world. This was due to exact measurements by satellites over that period of 30 years.
This was surprising after we'd been told for years that the seas were rising and would eventually impact and flood more coastal areas across the globe.
Here's the BBC report on the study and the data and measurements directly from the satellites.
The BBC link is worth a read.
https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-37187100
The study is from Nature climate change and does not have free access. Here is the link.
https://www.nature.com/articles/nclimate3111#article-info
This is from the study link page.
Earth's surface water change over the past 30 years
Gennadii Donchyts, Fedor Baart, Hessel Winsemius, Noel Gorelick, Jaap Kwadijk & Nick van de Giesen
Nature Climate Change volume 6, pages810–813(2016)Cite this article
"Earth's surface gained 115,000 km2 of water and 173,000 km2 of land over the past 30 years, including 20,135 km2 of water and 33,700 km2 of land in coastal areas. Here, we analyse the gains and losses through the Deltares Aqua Monitor — an open tool that detects land and water changes around the globe".
Thank you Dr Marohasy for that information. I am still not sure whether your position is that you accept (or reject) that there has been sea level rise since the start of the industrial revolution.
Here is Dr Rosling's 200 year video.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jbkSRLYSojo
A happy and prosperous new year to everyone. But in reality we've just lived through the most prosperous decade in human history.
I know this won't be what the extremists or con merchants want to hear but it's the truth whether they like it or not.
Matt Ridley lists some of the facts for everyone to understand, but I'm sure the usual eco-loons and Greta luvvies will twist and turn until they convince themselves that he must be wrong.
See his list of sources at the link or check Our World in Data or UN or Dr Roslings Gap minder etc. Lomborg is another source.
BTW check out our rapid prosperity from 1810 to 2009 after we had the sense to start using fossil fuels. Thanks to Dr Rosling and his team allowing anyone who has a few minutes to spare to understand how far we've come in just 200 years.
https://www.thegwpf.com/matt-ridley-weve-just-had-the-best-decade-in-human-history-seriously/
Peter Cook
You are quoting rates of at most 1.5 mm per year increase over the last 100 years? So, this is equivalent to 150 mm in total over the last hundred years or 0.15 metres?
There are cycles within cycles, generating oscillations within bands, when it comes to everything to do with climate. So, there may be some cycling-up over the last 100 or so years of around 15 centimetres in total? I thought the IPCC was quoting a value of more than double this: about 36 cms?
This is not inconsisent with the longer term trend of sea level fall since the Holocene High Stand which some claim to be 4,500 years ago, others closer to 7,000 years ago. This longer term trend -- that we can see with our eyes and also is supported by the technical literature -- suggests an overall fall in sea levels of about 1.5 metres.
I was recently sent this note with a list of technical papers. I actually have some more, and more recent reviews of Holocene sea level fall. If you would like I can email them to you. Let me know.
****
Note from Howard Brady from some months ago:
There is evidence of a gradual fall (not rise) from a high sea level stand between 8000 and 2000 BP. Such evidence comes from an increasing number of peer-reviewed articles describing evidence of this high sea level stand and its decline along the coasts of Australia, South Africa, South America, South Korea, and Vietnam. There is increasing evidence that such a wide occurrence of a high sea level stand, especially in the Southern Hemisphere, cannot be interpreted as due to crustal movements (Glacial Isostatic Adjustments -GIAs) in different continents at the same time as these areas did not experience any significant glacial or ice crustal loading during the last ice age advances. Basically, there is now so much data on this fall in sea level from a high-level stand that the GIAs quoted by Dutton and Lambeck 2012 should be abandoned. A few references to peer reviewed articles describing a high sea level stand in the HTM and the fall in sea-level from 8000 -2000 BP are listed below. There is no justification for any glacio-eustatic uplift since 8000 BP that stopped (for some unknown reason about 2000 BP) in regions that did not experience any ice loading during the last glaciation.
Accordi.A, Carbone, F 2016. Evolution of the siliciclastic-carbonate shelf system of the northern Kenyan coastal belt in response to Late Pleistocene-Holocene relative sea level changes. Journal of African Earth Sciences. Volume 123, November 2016, Pages 234-257
Baker,R.G.V., Haworth,R.J; 2000. Smooth or oscillating late Holocene sea-level curve? Evidence from the palaeo-zoology of fixed biological indicators in east Australia and beyond. Marine Geology 163, 367-386.
Baker,R.G.V., Haworth,R.J., Flood,P.G; 2001. Warmer or Cooler late Holocene palaeoenvironments? Interpreting south-east Australian and Brazilian sea level changes using fixed biological indicators and their d18 Oxygen composition. Palaeogeography, Palaeoclimatology, Palaeoecology 168. 249-272.
Baker,R.G.V., Haworth,R.J., Flood,P.G; 2001. Inter-tidal fixed indicators of former Holocene sea levels in Australia; a summary of sites and a review of methods and models. Quaternary International 83-85. 257-273.
Baker,R.G.V., Haworth,R.J., Flood,P.G; 2005.An Oscillating Holocene Sea-level? Revisiting Rottnest Island, Western Australia, and the Fairbridge Eustatic Hypothesis. Journal of Coastal Research, Special Issue no.42.
Bracco,B. et al; 2014. A reply to “Relative sea level during the Holocene in Uruguay. Palaeogeography, Palaeoclimatology, Palaeoecology.Volume 401.
Bradley, S, Milne,G, Horton,B, Zong,Y 2016. Modelling sea level data from China and Malay-Thailand to estimate Holocene ice-volume equivalent sea level change. Quaternary Science Reviews 137:54-68
Chiba,T et al;, 2016. Reconstruction of Holocene relative sea-level change and residual uplift in the Lake Inba area, Japan. Palaeogeography, Palaeoclimatology, PalaeoecologyVolume 441, Part 4,Pages 982-996
Clement, A, Whitehouse,P, Sloss,S 2015. An examination of spatial variability in the timing and magnitude of Holocene relative sea-level changes in the New Zealand archipelago. Quaternary Science Reviews. Volume 131, Part A. January 2016, Pages 73-101
Haworth,R.J., Baker,R.G.V., Flood,P.G; 2001. Predicted and observed Holocene sea-levels on the Australian coast: what do they indicate about hydrostatic models in far field sites? Journal of Quaternary Research 17. 5-6.
Lee, S., Currell. M, Cendon, D. 2015. Marine water from mid-Holocene sea level highstand trapped in a coastal aquifer: Evidence from groundwater isotopes, and environmental significance. Science of The Total Environment. Volume 544. February 2016, Pages 995-1007
Lunning,S, Vahrenholt, F. Im südlichen Afrika lag der Meeresspiegel vor 5000 Jahren um 3 m höher als heute- Kategorien: Allgemein, News/Termine.25. Juni 2018 | 07:30
Oliver and Terry, 2019. Relative sea-level highstands in Thailand since theMid-Holocene based on 14C rock oyster chronology. Palaeogeography, Palaeoclimatology, Palaeoecology,Volume 517. Pages 30-38
Prieto,A. Peltier, W. 2016. Relative sea-level changes in the Rio de la Plata, Argentina and Uruguay: A review. Quaternary International.
Sloss, Craig R,: 2005. Holocene sea-level change and the amino-stratigraphy of wave-dominated barrier estuaries on the southeast coast of Australia, PhD thesis, School of Earth and Environmental Sciences, University of Wollongong, 20. http://ro.uow.edu.au/theses/447.
Sloss, C.R, Murray-Wallace,C.V, Jones.B.G; (2007). Holocene sea-level change on the southeast coast of Australia: a review. The Holocene 17, 7. 999-1014.
Strachan K, et al;, 2014. A late Holocene sea-level curve for the east coast of South Africa. S. Afr. j. sci. vol.110 n.1-2
Jennifer,
Happy New Year.
When the reactionary trolls who have not read your work do drive by comments that only shot their ignorance, it is clear you are doing a good job.
Best wishes for a very successful and happy 2020!
Dr Marohasy, you ask where to get facts about sea level rise. May I suggest you start with peer reviewed science based on actual collection and analysis of data, such as the following:
White, Neil J., Ivan D. Haigh, John A. Church, Terry Koen, Christopher S. Watson, Tim R. Pritchard, Phil J. Watson et al. "Australian sea levels—Trends, regional variability and influencing factors." Earth-Science Reviews 136 (2014): 155-174.
To quote just one paragraph from this paper:
"Gehrels et al. (2012) used sea levels recorded in salt marsh sediments to infer sea level was stable in the Tasmanian and New Zealand region, at about 0.3 m lower than at present, through the middle and late Holocene up to the late 19th century. The rate of sea-level rise then increased in the late 19th century, resulting in a 20th century average rate of relative sea-level rise in eastern Tasmania of 1.5 ± 0.4 mm yr− 1. This, and other analyses (e.g. Lambeck, 2002, Gehrels and Woodworth, 2013) suggest an increase in the rate of global and regional sea-level rise in the late 19th and/or the early 20th Centuries. The earliest known direct measurements of sea level in Australia are from a two-year record (1841–1842) at Port Arthur, Tasmania relative to an 1841 benchmark (Hunter et al., 2003). Hunter et al. (2003) estimated a sea-level rise over the 159 years to 1999–2002 of 0.135 m (at an average rate of 0.8 mm yr− 1). If, following Gehrels et al. (2012), most of this rise occurred after 1890, the 20th century rate would be 1.3 mm yr− 1, or 1.5 mm yr− 1 after correction for land uplift (Hunter et al., 2003 and Hunter pers comm)."
I assume you have robust arguments (perhaps even a published paper) which demonstrates the above points are wrong, and in fact sea levels are now falling?
Sally says:
"You cannot measure global sea level trends by visual observations at your local beach."
Sally, over a long period of time this is the most factual way of observing what sea levels are really doing.
For example, when I observed fine weather king tides [at around normal barometric pressure, not cyclonic] from 1946 to 1953 coming just over the top of our sea wall and trickling into our well [if we didn't keep a levy bank around it] and for the last 10 years those normal BP king tides are up to 250 mm LOWER than 70 years ago, there is no better data than that to advise me that sea levels are not rising.
When I see our ocean beaches wider than they have been in my lifetime and ocean-front houses that we struggled to save from washing out to sea now changing hands for tens of millions when you couldn't give them away back then, that is very conclusive evidence that sea levels are not rising.
Why is it that many of the main promoters of the "climate crisis" are very wealthy people but are still perfectly relaxed in spending a large part of their fortune on sea-front mansions?
Do you think they really believe alarmist sea level predictions?
Here’s an interesting article about the time after 2010- 2011 when Australia was able to change the satellite GLOBAL MSL graph.
So much water was contained within the continent because of very heavy rainfall from la nina+ negative IOD events that the global MSL graph had a pronounced drop ( gully) for more than a year.
It just proves that we can have major floods and droughts in Australia over a short period of time. Don’t forget that 2016 was also a MDB flood year because of another negative IOD.
There is a link to the Uni Colorado MSL graph below showing the big drop after 2011.
http://sealevel.colorado.edu/
https://www.newscientist.com/article/dn24080-how-an-ocean-went-into-hiding-in-australia/