Accelerating sea-level rise and coastal marsh stability: Insights from an early Holocene stratigraphic record
Abstract
The increasingly recognized economic and ecologic value of coastal ecosystems and growing concerns about the fate of coastal wetlands in the face of anticipated accelerating sea-level rise in the next century provide the impetus to understand coastal marsh stability under climate warming conditions. This problem is strikingly exemplified by the Mississippi Delta, where wetland loss rates are among the highest in the world. Direct field observations of marsh responses to rising seas are helpful to understand marsh stability over short (annual to decadal) timescales. However, knowledge about marsh stability over longer timescales is largely lacking. Here we present an early Holocene stratigraphic and foraminiferal record from the Mississippi Delta to examine marsh responses to relative sea-level (RSL) rise at rates within the range of what is commonly predicted for the latter portion of the 21st century. While field monitoring of modern marshes has suggested that they may survive rates of RSL rise on the order of 1 cm/yr, our results show that marshes can persist only for up to a century, and often much shorter, with rates of RSL rise of ~0.7 cm/yr. We therefore conclude that the tipping point beyond which coastal marshes in this region become unsustainable may be reached earlier than what previous studies have suggested. These findings may be instrumental in long-term planning and mitigating impacts of anticipated sea-level rise on coastal ecosystems.
- Publication:
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AGU Fall Meeting Abstracts
- Pub Date:
- December 2011
- Bibcode:
- 2011AGUFMOS43D..04L
- Keywords:
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- 1641 GLOBAL CHANGE / Sea level change;
- 4217 OCEANOGRAPHY: GENERAL / Coastal processes