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Wednesday, January 15th, 2014

Rising Sea Levels Hitting US East Coast, Costing Big Money

Author:     PAUL WALLIS
Source:     Digital Journal
Publication Date:     13-Jan-14
 Link: Rising Sea Levels Hitting US East Coast, Costing Big Money
Stephan:   This piece tries too hard to be insouciant, but it has a good take on the East Coast, and you can begin to see the kind of costs we are going to pay to deal with sea rise and, that will lead to the debate over what will have to be abandoned. Much of Virginia Beach and Norfolk, for example. I also picked this story because of the video. Click through to see the video of that area, which gives you a sense of scale of even a modest project. One good thing. It is going to create a lot of skilled jobs. I have worked ay this scale and I can tell you from direct experience that to be successful it requires great skill. Or people get killed and the job doesn't get done.

NEW YORK — Forget denial, this is happening right now. New data from NOAA and a range of incidents along the east coast are rewriting the realities of sea level rise. A combination of rising sea levels and sinking coastal land is hitting the entire US east coast.

The results are costing a lot of money and damaging property values severely. New data from NOAA, (National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration) indicates that the future is looking expensive, and destructive, for the entire east coast.
The New York Times explains the metrics:

“The work starts with the tides. Because of their importance to navigation, they have been measured for the better part of two centuries. While the record is not perfect, scientists say it leaves no doubt that the world’s oceans are rising. The best calculation suggests that from 1880 to 2009, the global average sea level rose a little over eight inches.”
The result-
Sinking islands, and ‘routine flooding”
People complaining about always “driving through salt water”??? (What, if they drown, there’s a problem?)
Huge expenditure on flood mitigation

The New York Times got some materials from the American Geophysical Union, so I decided to do some digging there.
What’s happening is […]

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