Climate and scenarios of sea level and waves in the Mediterranean Sea

In this work, we aim to provide climatology and future scenarios of the sea level and wave parameters over the Mediterranean Sea, focusing on the Adriatic Sea. The period for climatology covers all the years from 1994 to 2020, while two scenarios (IPCC RCP4.5, RCP8.5) are projected in the future (2021-2050) for the waves in the Adriatic Sea and compared to a historical control period (1981-2010). Past runs are forced by CERRA reanalysis wind and pressure fields, which have been validated against observed data, while future scenarios and control run for the Adriatic Sea wave climate are forced by the COSMO-CLM climatological model winds. The sea level is obtained through simulations with a hydrodynamic finite element model, named SHYFEM, and with an Ensemble Kalman Filter data assimilation system. We used all the available observations of sea level from local stations along the Mediterranean coasts, after processing them. Assimilation works well in reanalysis, providing an excellent reproduction of the sea level, obtained by the ensemble mean. The wave data is provided as a hindcast product, obtained by coupled runs of SHYFEM with the WAVEWATCH III (WW3) over the Mediterranean Sea. Moreover, in the Adriatic Sea, we provide WW3 results with high resolution, both for the historical period and for future scenarios. This work has been performed as part of the CoastClim project, a PNRR-Return project led by the University of Bologna.