ORIGINAL RESEARCH article
Front. Clim.
Sec. Climate Services
This article is part of the Research TopicAdvances in modeling of coastal and estuarine waters: assessing stressors, analyzing extreme events, and addressing current and future risksView all 4 articles
Assessing Climate Change Impact on Storm Surge and Funding Strategies in East Peninsular Malaysia
Provisionally accepted
- 1University of Technology Petronas, Tronoh, Malaysia
- 2Kumamoto Daigaku, Kumamoto, Japan
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Climate change is intensifying storm surge risks in Southeast Asia, particularly along Malaysia's east coast facing the South China Sea. This study uses the d4PDF climate dataset to simulate maximum storm surge heights under 2°C and 4°C global warming scenarios. Results show that projected surge heights exceed 1 meter at all key coastal stations, with localized surges reaching up to 1.8 meters. By integrating these projections with 2014–2024 flood loss statistics and national budget allocations, the study identifies a concerning mismatch between increasing storm surge risks and current mitigation investments, suggesting that existing policy frameworks are underfunded and may lack the capacity to adequately protect high-risk coastal areas. To address this, the study recommends the development of a unified regional storm surge prediction and response system that integrates real-time data and supports cross-border coordination. It also proposes the establishment of standardized infrastructure guidelines tailored to storm surge resilience, and calls for increased investment in community-based risk mapping powered by artificial intelligence (AI). These strategies provide an actionable framework for strengthening disaster management, improving policy responsiveness, and enhancing coastal resilience across Malaysia and Southeast Asia.
Keywords: Climate change modelling1, storm surge prediction2, coastal engineering3, disasterrisk reduction4, policy assessment5
Received: 26 May 2025; Accepted: 14 Nov 2025.
Copyright: © 2025 ROSLI, Teh and Kim. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence: NURDIYANA NABILAH ROSLI, nurdiyanarosli@gmail.com
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