GLOBAL SANDY BEACH AREAS

Approximately 30% of the global ice-free coastline is stated to be sandy (Luijendijk et al., 2018). Sandy beaches hold an important socio-economic value related to tourism and recreation and simultaneously fulfill various ecosystem services like providing food, water and maintaining biodiversity. Sandy systems are among the most dynamic environments in the world and are under enormous pressure from climate change (e.g., sea level rise) and anthropogenic influences (e.g., coastal squeeze from artificial structures), while they are only marginally monitored by costly labor-intensive monitoring campaigns (Turner et al., 2016 and Castelle et al., 2020). Yet, at present, there is no global dataset on sandy beach area available that allows to accurately estimate the potential loss of these aesthetic environments. In this study we will address this gap and present insights in sandy beach areas across the globe, derived from over a million of optical satellite images from the Sentinel-2 constellation.