Assessment of coastal vulnerability in Chabahar Bay due to climate change scenarios

Abstract

A substantial body of research has shown that two key factors of global sea level rise are thermal expansion and melting of land-based ice, glaciers and ice sheets. Moreover, climate change may result in changes to wind speeds and directions, consequently resulting in contributions to variations in wind-wave components, wave heights and directions. In this research, climate change scenarios were used to assess the coastal vulnerability to the Chabahar port area due to global sea level rise, significant wave height changes and tidal regime effects. These three items were calculated separately using numerical models and the impacts of possible climate change scenarios were applied to estimate possible changes to these items by 2100. Significant wave heights for 25, 50 and 100-year return periods were evaluated. Based on statistical analysis, the maximum significant wave heights for the A2 and A1B scenarios were estimated at approximately 13.7 and 7.6, respectively. Since the main aim of this research was to assess the coastal zones at higher flood risk, therefore the mean global sea level rise, extreme values of significant wave heights and tidal heights were investigated. The height of sea during sea storms and for the most extreme case was calculated as 17.3 m and 11.2 m for A2 and the A1B scenarios, respectively. According to output maps of inundation areas, large coastal zones in the Chabahar port area are at risk due to the sea storms and possible climate change.