Abstract
It has been reported that global warming results in the increase of globally averaged wave heights. What happened to the global-averaged wave heights during the global warming slowdown period (1999–2013)? Using reanalysis products, together with remote sensing and in situ observational data, it was found that the temporal variation pattern of the globally averaged wave heights was similar to the slowdown trend in the increase in global mean surface temperature during the same period. The analysis of the spatial distribution of trends in wave height variation revealed different rates in global oceans: a downward trend in the northeastern Pacific and southern Indian Ocean, and an upward trend in other regions. The decomposition of waves into swells and wind waves demonstrates that swells dominate global wave height variations, which indicates that local sea surface winds indirectly affect the slowdown in the rate of wave height growth.
Highlights
Coastal and offshore engineering projects are significantly affected by wind-generated waves
We used ERA5 [28] and ERA-Interim [29] reanalysis datasets produced by the European Center for Medium-Range Weather Forecast (ECMWF), satellite altimeter data from the French Research Institute for the Exploitation of the Sea (IFREMER), and National
The significant wave height (SWH) from ERA5 is approximately equal to the average height of the highest third of the surface ocean waves generated by wind and swell
Summary
Coastal and offshore engineering projects are significantly affected by wind-generated waves. 2021, 13, 4096 in global waves before 2008, and global winds and waves from 1985 to 2018, have been examined using satellite data These studies showed that both values increased slightly, especially in extreme conditions, with the largest growth in the Southern Ocean [1,17]. A proposed mechanism for these changes is that ocean warming was a crucial factor affecting global winds and, the waves they generate. Ocean warming in different basins may affect wind conditions through sea surface temperature (SST), leading to an increase in global wave energy [18]. The above-mentioned studies used multi-source data to analyze wave trends in different ocean regions over different periods, none of them, focused on the characteristics of the global wave climate during the global warming slowdown period.
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