Skip to main content

Thank you for visiting nature.com. You are using a browser version with limited support for CSS. To obtain the best experience, we recommend you use a more up to date browser (or turn off compatibility mode in Internet Explorer). In the meantime, to ensure continued support, we are displaying the site without styles and JavaScript.

  • Matters Arising
  • Published:

Sandy beaches can survive sea-level rise

Nature Climate Change volume 10, pages 993–995 (2020)Cite this article

Subjects

Matters Arising to this article was published on 27 October 2020

The Original Article was published on 02 March 2020

arising from M. I. Vousdoukas et al. Nature Climate Change https://doi.org/10.1038/s41558-020-0697-0 (2020)

Vousdoukas et al.1 assert that global sea-level rise (SLR) poses a threat to the existence of sandy beaches. They use global databases of sandy beaches, bathymetry and wave conditions to drive a simple model based on the Bruun rule to quantify shoreline retreat, to which they add a background ambient trend based on satellite data. When retreat is more than 100 m by 2100, they declare those beaches near extinct by the end of the century. We feel that this is an incorrect and potentially damaging finding. Critical to the paper’s conclusions is the fact that, provided that accommodation space is available, beaches migrate landwards as sea level rises and shorelines retreat. Many contemporary beaches formed thousands of years ago and migrated landwards during postglacial SLR2. Globally, hundreds of beaches have been retreating at rapid rates for more than a century, but have not been extinguished3. In southwest France, for example, the shoreline has receded >100 m but still has wide and healthy beaches4. The underlying premise of Vousdoukas et al.1 originates in an inappropriate model—the Bruun rule, in which SLR promotes offshore sediment transport. As stated in their methods1: SLR-induced shoreline retreat “…depends on the amplitude of SLR and the transfer of sediment from the subaerial to the submerged part of the active beach profile”. While we agree that offshore sediment transport might happen in cases of very steep topography, in most cases sediment transport is onshore during SLR2,5.

This is a preview of subscription content, access via your institution

Access options

Buy this article

  • Purchase on SpringerLink
  • Instant access to the full article PDF.

USD 39.95

Prices may be subject to local taxes which are calculated during checkout

Fig. 1: The geomorphology and material landward of a sandy beach are important determinants of its behaviour under SLR.

References

  1. Vousdoukas, M. I. et al. Sandy coastlines under threat of erosion. Nat. Clim. Change 10, 260–263 (2020).

    Google Scholar 

  2. Carter, R. W. G. & Woodroffe, C. D. Coastal Evolution (Cambridge Univ. Press, 1994).

  3. Bird, E. C. F. Coastline Changes: A Global Review (Wiley, 1985).

  4. Castelle, B. et al. Spatial and temporal patterns of shoreline change of a 280-km high-energy disrupted sandy coast from 1950 to 2014: SW France. Estuar. Coast. Shelf Sci. 200, 212–223 (2018).

    Google Scholar 

  5. Woodroffe, C. D. Coasts: Form, Process and Evolution (Cambridge Univ. Press, 2002).

  6. Green, A. N. et al. Geomorphic and stratigraphic signals of postglacial meltwater pulses on continental shelves. Geology 42, 151–154 (2014).

    Google Scholar 

  7. Brooke, B. P. et al. Relative sea-level records preserved in Holocene beach-ridge strandplains—an example from tropical northeastern Australia. Mar. Geol. 411, 107–118 (2019).

    Google Scholar 

  8. Cooper, J. A. G. & Pilkey, O. H. Sea-level rise and shoreline retreat: time to abandon the Bruun Rule. Glob. Planet. Change 43, 157–171 (2004).

    Google Scholar 

  9. Rosati, J. D. et al. The modified Bruun Rule extended for landward transport. Mar. Geol. 340, 71–81 (2013).

    Google Scholar 

  10. Dean, R. G. & Houston, J. R. Determining shoreline response to sea level rise. Coast. Eng. 114, 1–8 (2016).

    Google Scholar 

  11. Davidson-Arnott, R. G. Conceptual model of the effects of sea level rise on sandy coasts. J. Coast. Res. 21, 1166–1172 (2005).

    Google Scholar 

  12. Wolinsky, M. A. & Murray, A. B. A unifying framework for shoreline migration: 2. Application to wave-dominated coasts. J. Geophys. Res. 114, F01009 (2009).

    Google Scholar 

  13. Anthony, E. et al. Chenier morphodynamics and degradation on the Amazon-influenced coast of Suriname, South America: implications for beach ecosystem services. Front. Earth Sci. 7, 35 (2019).

    Google Scholar 

  14. Cooper, J. A. G. et al. Geological constraints on mesoscale coastal barrier behaviour. Glob. Planet. Change 168, 15–34 (2018).

    Google Scholar 

  15. Pilkey, O. H. & Cooper, J. A. G. The Last Beach (Duke Univ. Press, 2014).

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. School of Geography and Environmental Science, Ulster University, Coleraine, UK

    J. A. G. Cooper & D. W. T. Jackson

  2. Geological Sciences, University of KwaZulu-Natal, Durban, South Africa

    J. A. G. Cooper, A. N. Green & D. W. T. Jackson

  3. Coastal Processes Research Group, Plymouth University, Plymouth, UK

    G. Masselink

  4. School of Environment, Faculty of Science, University of Auckland, Auckland, New Zealand

    G. Coco

  5. School of Geosciences, University of Sydney, Sydney, New South Wales, Australia

    A. D. Short

  6. CNRS, UMR EPOC 5805, Université de Bordeaux 1, Pessac, France

    B. Castelle

  7. School of Earth, Atmospheric and Life Sciences, University of Wollongong, Wollongong, New South Wales, Australia

    K. Rogers

  8. Aix Marseille University, CNRS, IRD, INRA, Coll France, CEREGE, Aix-en-Provence, France

    E. Anthony

  9. USR LEEISA, CNRS, Cayenne, French Guiana

    E. Anthony

  10. School of Earth and Climate Sciences, University of Maine, Orono, ME, USA

    J. T. Kelley

  11. Nicholas School of the Environment, Duke University, Durham, NC, USA

    O. H. Pilkey

Authors
  1. J. A. G. Cooper
    View author publications

    Search author on:PubMed Google Scholar

  2. G. Masselink
    View author publications

    Search author on:PubMed Google Scholar

  3. G. Coco
    View author publications

    Search author on:PubMed Google Scholar

  4. A. D. Short
    View author publications

    Search author on:PubMed Google Scholar

  5. B. Castelle
    View author publications

    Search author on:PubMed Google Scholar

  6. K. Rogers
    View author publications

    Search author on:PubMed Google Scholar

  7. E. Anthony
    View author publications

    Search author on:PubMed Google Scholar

  8. A. N. Green
    View author publications

    Search author on:PubMed Google Scholar

  9. J. T. Kelley
    View author publications

    Search author on:PubMed Google Scholar

  10. O. H. Pilkey
    View author publications

    Search author on:PubMed Google Scholar

  11. D. W. T. Jackson
    View author publications

    Search author on:PubMed Google Scholar

Contributions

J.A.G.C. wrote the initial draft and all authors discussed, commented upon and made substantial contributions to successive drafts.

Corresponding author

Correspondence to J. A. G. Cooper.

Ethics declarations

Competing interests

The authors declare no competing interests.

Additional information

Peer review information Nature Climate Change thanks Charles Fletcher and the other, anonymous, reviewer(s) for their contribution to the peer review of this work.

Publisher’s note Springer Nature remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations.

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Check for updates. Verify currency and authenticity via CrossMark

Cite this article

Cooper, J.A.G., Masselink, G., Coco, G. et al. Sandy beaches can survive sea-level rise. Nat. Clim. Chang. 10, 993–995 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41558-020-00934-2

Download citation

  • Received:

  • Accepted:

  • Published:

  • Version of record:

  • Issue date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41558-020-00934-2

This article is cited by

Search

Advanced search

Quick links

Nature Briefing Anthropocene

Sign up for the Nature Briefing: Anthropocene newsletter — what matters in anthropocene research, free to your inbox weekly.

Get the most important science stories of the day, free in your inbox. Sign up for Nature Briefing: Anthropocene