Satellite altimeters have provided near‐global coverage of the ocean with a continuous record now approaching 3 decades. These observations have led to definitive evidence of an increase in global mean sea‐level, while offering a depiction of the spatial variability in sea‐level change. As a result of the increasing length of the altimeter record, studies have sought to understand and detect the emergence of a forced or anthropogenic response in sea‐level. The central idea behind these studies is that the altimeter record is now long enough that the influence of interannual to decadal variability is reduced and does not obscure underlying regional trends in the way that it did for the early part of the altimeter record. Two locations—the western tropical Pacific and the northeastern Pacific off the west coast of the United States—are noteworthy for their sea‐level variations during the altimeter era, exhibiting large departures from the global average albeit in opposite directions. In this study, we examine satellite altimeter‐measured sea‐level in these two regions. The goals are to understand the evolution of the sea‐level trend, and determine what can be inferred about future sea‐level change from the satellite altimeter record. We find that in the two locations considered here the altimetry record is still too short to rule out natural variability contributions to the trend on the order of 1 mm/yr. Using longer records from tide‐gauge observations and models, an assessment of the potential future changes in both regions is made for both regions.

中文翻译：

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过去，现在和将来的太平洋海平面变化

卫星测高仪提供了近乎全球的海洋覆盖，连续记录现已接近3年。这些观察结果提供了全球平均海平面上升的确凿证据，同时提供了海平面变化的空间变异性的描述。由于高度计记录长度的增加，研究试图了解和发现海平面中强迫或人为反应的出现。这些研究背后的中心思想是，高度计记录现在已经足够长，以致年际变化到年代际变化的影响减小了，并且不会像高度计记录的早期那样掩盖潜在的区域趋势。值得注意的是，两个海拔高度较高的地区（美国西部海岸的西部热带太平洋和东北太平洋）在高度计时代的海平面变化非常明显，尽管与全球平均水平方向相反，但仍存在较大差异。在这项研究中，我们检查了这两个地区的卫星高度计测量的海平面。目的是了解海平面趋势的演变，并确定可以从卫星高度计记录中推断出未来海平面变化的方法。我们发现，在此处考虑的两个位置，测高记录仍然太短，无法排除自然可变性对趋势的影响，约为每年1毫米。使用潮汐观测和模型的更长记录，对两个地区的未来潜在变化进行了评估。