Land Subsidence on Java Island and Its Contributions to Relative Sea Level Change

Ohenhen, Leonard O., Shirzaei, Manoochehr, Kumar, Praveen, Aditiya, Arif, Tiwari, Ashutosh, Davis, James L., Kolawole, Folarin, Chaussard, Estelle, Sadhasivam, Nitheshnirmal, Dasho, Oluwaseyi, Zhong, Wen, James, Roselyn H., Daramola, Samuel, Nicholls, Robert ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-9715-1109 and Minderhoud, Philip S. J. (2026) Land Subsidence on Java Island and Its Contributions to Relative Sea Level Change. Science Advances, 12 (15). ISSN 2375-2548

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Abstract

Rising sea levels and land subsidence combine to determine relative sea-level (RSL) rise, which is intensifying coastal hazards. However, many densely populated regions lack the observational infrastructure to identify and quantify land subsidence contribution to RSL, hindering effective planning of responses. Here, we utilized satellite radar observations to generate a high-resolution assessment of land subsidence across Java Island, Indonesia, and evaluate its contribution to 21st-century RSL change. We identify widespread and temporally evolving subsidence with rates ranging from 1-15 cm per year in multiple coastal cities. Using machine learning spatiotemporal clustering and ancillary datasets, we attribute the dominant subsidence mechanisms to resource extraction across various geographic and geological settings. We further construct virtual tide gauges at 5-km intervals along the northern coastline, revealing that contemporary subsidence will dominate RSL budgets over the next 25 years along >75% of the coast. These findings underscore the urgent need to integrate subsidence into sea-level risk and adaptation assessments in vulnerable coastal regions.

Item Type:	Article
Additional Information:	Data and materials availability: The vertical land motion and horizontal land motion data for Java Island is available at https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.15786356. The Sentinel-1 data used in this study are publicly available through the Alaska Satellite Facility and can be accessed at https://search.asf.alaska.edu. The medium and low confidence projected Relative Sea level change and rates for five SSPs (SSP1-1.9, SSP1-2.6, SSP2-4.5, SSP3-7.0, and SSP5-8.5) is available at https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.15786356. The satellite altimetry data for sea level rise is available from Copernicus Marine Environment Monitoring Service (CMEMS) and is available through https://data.marine.copernicus.eu/product/SEALEVEL_GLO_PHY_L4_MY_008_047/download. Access requires the creation of a free CMEMS user account, which is available to all users at no cost upon registration. The population for Java Island was estimated using the WorldPop dataset available through https://hub.worldpop.org/geodata/summary?id=77690. The coastal elevation referenced to mean sea-level uses the DeltaDTM dataset v1.1 available through https://doi.org/10.4121/21997565. All other data needed to evaluate the conclusions in the paper are present in the paper and/or the Supplementary Materials.
Faculty \ School:	University of East Anglia Research Groups/Centres > Theme - ClimateUEA Faculty of Science > Tyndall Centre for Climate Change Research University of East Anglia Research Groups/Centres > Faculty of Science > Research Centres > Tyndall Centre for Climate Change Research
UEA Research Groups:	Faculty of Science > Research Groups > Collaborative Centre for Sustainable Use of the Seas
Related URLs:	https://www.scopus.com/pages/publication...
Depositing User:	LivePure Connector
Date Deposited:	01 Jul 2026 15:51
Last Modified:	02 Jul 2026 16:05
URI:	https://ueaeprints.uea.ac.uk/id/eprint/103588
DOI:	10.1126/sciadv.aec0172

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