Coastal shoreline change assessments at global scales
Jonathan A. Warrick, Daniel Buscombe, Kilian Vos, Karin R. Bryan, Bruno Castelle, Andrew Cooper, Mitch D. Harley, Derek Jackson, Bonnie C. Ludka, Gerd Masselink, Margaret L. Palmsten, Amaia Ruiz de Alegría‐Arzaburu, Nadia Sénéchal, Christopher R. Sherwood, Andrew D. Short, Erdinc Sogut, Kristen D. Splinter, Wayne Stephenson, Jaia Syvitski, Adam P. Young
Abstract
During the present era of rapid climate change and sea-level rise, coastal change science is needed at global, regional, and local scales. Essential elements of this science, regardless of scale, include that the methods are defendable and that the results are independently verifiable. The recent contribution by Almar et al. 1 does not achieve either of these measures as shown by: (i) the use of an error-prone proxy for coastal shoreline and (ii) analyses that are circular and explain little of the data variance.