California winter waves may be growing as planet warms, researcher says

California winter wave heights may be increasing under climate change, researchers say. 

In a study published Tuesday in the Journal of Geophysical Research - Oceans, U.C. San Diego Scripps Institution of Oceanography's researcher emeritus Peter Bromirski used 90 years of seismic data to infer wave heights, revealing that the average heights of winter waves along the Golden State's coast has increased as the planet has warmed.

Bromirski used seismic records dating back to 1931 to infer wave height, filtering out the "noise" of actual earthquakes. 

He explained in a release that when waves reach shallow coastal waters, some of their energy is reflected back out to sea, and when that energy collides with approaching waves, the collision creates a downward pressure signal that is converted in seismic energy at the seafloor. That seismic energy moves inland in the form of se...