Conceptual Design of Extreme Sea-Level Early Warning Systems Based on Uncertainty Quantification and Engineering Optimization Methods

Abstract

Coastal hazards linked to extreme sea-level events are projected to have a direct impact (by flooding) on 630 million of people by year 2100. Numerous operational forecasts already provide coastal hazard assessments around the world. However, they are largely based on either deterministic tools (e.g., numerical ocean and atmospheric models) or ensemble approaches which are both highly demanding in terms of high-performance computing (HPC) resources. Through a robust learning process, we propose conceptual design of an innovative architecture for extreme sea-level early warning systems based on uncertainty quantification/reduction and optimization methods. This approach might be cost-effective in terms of real-time computational needs while maintaining reliability and trustworthiness of the hazard assessments. The proposed architecture relies on three main tools aligning numerical forecasts with observations: (1) surrogate models of extreme sea-levels using polynomial chaos expansion, Gaussian processes or machine learning, (2) fast data assimilation via Bayesian inference, and (3) optimal experimental design of the observational network. A surrogate model developed for meteotsunami events – i.e., atmospherically induced long ocean waves in a tsunami frequency band – has already been proven to greatly improve the reliability of extreme sea-level hazard assessments. Such an approach might be promising for several coastal hazards known to destructively impact the world coasts, like hurricanes or typhoons and seismic tsunamis.