Understanding geographical distribution of future sea level projections in a Model for Interdisciplinary Research on Climate version 3.2(MIROC3.2)

Geographical distribution of sea level changes resulting from CO2-induced climate changes have been investigated in a series of idealized experiments with medium-resolution version of MIROC3.2. Regional sea level change is mainly related to density changes (baroclinic component) due to the surface fluxes of heat, freshwater and wind stress. Sea level change in barotropic circulation shown in the Southern Ocean is mainly related by the wind stress. We also found regional sea level change due to the water volume input without density change. The magnitude is comparable with the baroclinic and barotropic components. The water volume input is not reproduced in rigid-rid OGCMs. So, climate model with free surface OGCM might be essential to project feature sea level changes. This work was supported by KAKENHI 18740305.