National climate services for the German coasts

The German coastal areas of the North Sea and Baltic Sea: Wadden Sea World Heritage Site, 23000 km² of shipping lanes, around 600 km of dyke line and home of over 7 million people.

Numerous actors such as coastal conservationists and port operators work on and with the coast. Climate change poses challenges for all of them. In order to meet these, knowledge about changes to the system due to climate change must be compiled. Possible impacts on the various fields of action must be evaluated and communicated.

The Federal Maritime and Hydrographic Agency (BSH) is providing climate information based on observations and remote sensing data as well as water level forecasts, storm surge warnings and ice information for the German coast. In recent years, these fully established services were complemented by the DAS core service “Climate and Water” which is one of the measures translating the political framework “German Strategy for Adaption to Climate Change” (DAS) into action.

We will provide information on the existing product portfolio of the national climate services, ranging from historical ice conditions to information on storms and sea level variations. Additionally, our service now includes information from high resolution climate simulations, and first results of the BSH model runs will be presented here. Special focus will be on the establishement of a feedback loop with important customers  and on the challenges in the user-provider-dialog.