Climate Change Impacts

The CoSMoS model is currently available for most of the California coast and is now being expanded to support the 4.5 million coastal residents of the Puget Sound region, with emphasis on the communities bordering the sound.

The Coastal Storm Modeling System (CoSMoS) makes detailed predictions of storm-induced coastal flooding, erosion, and cliff failures over large geographic scales. CoSMoS was developed for hindcast studies, operational applications and future climate scenarios to provide emergency responders and coastal planners with critical storm-hazards information that can be used to increase public safety...

USGS scientists installed two video cameras atop a windmill tower in Unalakleet, Alaska, pointing westward over Norton Sound, to observe and quantify coastal processes such as wave run-up, development of rip channels, bluff erosion, and movement of sandbars and ice floes.

Two coastal observing video cameras are installed atop a utility pole near the northernmost point of land in the United States, at Nuvuk (Point Barrow), Alaska. The cameras point northwest toward the Arctic Ocean and the boundary between the Chukchi and Beaufort Seas, and will be used to observe and quantify coastal processes such as wave run-up, bluff erosion, movement of sandbars and ice floes...

Two video cameras overlook the coast at Sunset State Beach in Watsonville, California. Camera 1 looks northwest while Camera 2 looks north. The cameras are part of the Remote Sensing Coastal Change project.

Essential habitat for wild salmon and other wildlife borders river deltas and estuaries in the Pacific Northwest. These estuaries also support industry, agriculture, and a large human population that’s expected to double by the year 2060, but each could suffer from more severe river floods, higher sea level, and storm surges caused by climate change.

The USGS Coastal Storm Modeling System (CoSMoS) team has extensively studied overland flooding and coastal change due to rising seas and storms. Interactions with coastal stakeholders have elucidated another important question; will rising seas also intrude into coastal aquifers and raise groundwater tables? The CoSMoS-Groundwater (CoSMoS-GW) modeling effort seeks to provide initial insight into...

From May of 2018 through November of 2019, USGS scientists collected imagery from video cameras overlooking the coast along a beach on Whidbey Island, Island County at the northern boundary of Puget Sound in western Washington.

CoSMoS v3.1 for central California shows projections for future climate scenarios (sea-level rise and storms)

USGS scientists installed video cameras atop a building and oceanographic instruments off San Juan, Puerto Rico, to better understand how waves move across coral reefs and cause flooding on tropical shorelines.

Arctic Alaska is warming faster than the rest of the United States. A major consequence of this warming is permafrost thaw, which threatens infrastructure, alters habitat, increases fire risk, changes nutrient and sediment delivery to the coastal ocean, and enhances greenhouse gas release. The warming climate has already dramatically reduced the thickness and annual duration of sea ice, rendering...

USGS activities related to the project, "Climate Impacts to Arctic Coasts."