para bellum
Platinum Member
I think what the paper was saying is 30 years of satellite altimetry data is too short a period due to natural oceanic oscillations. e.g. The "constant acceleration" is an artifact of Nerem's methodology. Over a 100 year span, it zeros out. Or to put it another way, there are periods of "positive" acceleration and periods of "negative" acceleration. It all averages out to the 1/8" per decade that we have seen since the end of the LIA.Quick nitpick, constant acceleration is a quadratic, no curve fitting needed ... with Nerem's 0.082 mm/yr/yr acceleration value we can derive the quadratic equation:
Also it's a fact that satellites drift, and they have to be periodically calibrated against tidal gauges.
Plate movement is of course a factor for RSL (which is the type of SLR that we experience after all). The Pacific Plate is going under the North American Plate, causing the western US to lift, and the eastern US to sink. So the sea level is rising on the east coast, and not on the west coast, and that is evidenced by the tidal gauges.
Obviously no amount of CO2 reduction can possibly have any effect on continental drift...
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