NCCOS Ecological Effects of Sea Level Rise in the Northern Gulf of Mexico (EESLR-NGOM): Mean High Water and Salt Marsh Productivity (Hydro-MEM) (NCEI Accession 0170338)

This dataset contains salt marsh productivity projections under different sea level rise scenarios for the northern Gulf of Mexico (Florida panhandle, Alabama, and Mississippi) using a coupled hydrodynamic-marsh model called Hydro-MEM (Alizad et al. 2016a and 2016b). The modeled outputs were derived through integrated modeling of tidal hydrodynamics (ADCIRC) and marsh productivity (Marsh Equilibrium Model, or MEM) that incorporates dynamic feedbacks among physical and biological processes. The Hydro-MEM model incorporates biological feedback by including the MEM accretion formulation, while also implementing a friction coefficient effect that varies between subtidal and intertidal states. The Hydro-MEM model is capable of capturing the biophysical feedback that modifies relative salt marsh elevation and the biological feedback on hydrodynamics (Alizad et al. 2016a).

There are two types of Hydro-MEM model outputs resulting from the Ecological Effects of Sea Level Rise Northern Gulf of Mexico (EESLR-NGOM) project: 1) Salt Marsh Productivity (Low/Medium/High) [202MB total file size, 919 files (unzipped)] and 2) Mean High Water [431 MB total file size, 137 files (unzipped)]. These outputs were generated for areas surrounding the following National Estuarine Research Reserves: Apalachicola (FL), Weeks Bay (AL), and Grand Bay (MS). Each Hydro-MEM model output, described above, is provided for incremental time steps (5 or 20Y) for the following 5 sea level rise scenarios (Parris et al. 2012): Initial Condition (no change from c. 2000 mean sea level (MSL)), Low (+0.2m from MSL), Intermediate-Low (+0.5m from MSL), Intermediate-High (+1.2m from MSL), and High (+2.0m from MSL). Mean high water data are provided for each SLR scenario for two timesteps (2050 and 2100).