Fig. 1. Earth system model representation of the coastal interface.

Current Earth system models (ESMs) represent the land and ocean as disconnected systems, with freshwater discharge being the only meaningful connection. Next-generation models should represent land–sea connections by incorporating coastal features such as the tidal rivers, wetlands, estuaries, the continental shelf, and tidal exchange across the coastal terrestrial–aquatic interface. This likely necessitates coupling different models to produce details at the sub-grid scale.