Alabama is one of at least six coastal states, including Georgia, South Carolina, and Texas, and 18 nationwide that haven’t adopted plans to cut carbon emissions or taken other steps to combat the effects of climate change, according to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. Other states have acted after natural disasters made rising water impossible to ignore. Last year, New York and New Jersey started programs to buy waterfront property damaged by Hurricane Sandy to serve as a ‘coastal buffer zone” against floods. Rick Scott, Florida’s GOP governor, who’s avoided talking about climate change, says his state has spent $130 million on coastal flood protection. In 2012, Louisiana’s legislature approved a Coastal Master Plan, a set of infrastructure projects to gird the state, devastated by Hurricane Katrina in 2005, against storms.

None of these states formally cited global warming as the reason for the plans. Harrison hopes Alabama will follow their lead. Climate change skeptics could hold fast to their beliefs and still approve money to fortify the state against extreme weather no matter the cause. Policymakers need to ‘realize that this is a potential threat,” he says.

It’s unclear how Alabama can best protect itself from rising water, because the state […]