Old Dominion University Seeks to be Hub for Research on Rising Sea Level

It's a bit surreal to watch as Virginia's insane Attorney General Ken "Kookinelli" Cuccinelli seeks to discredit climate change even as one of Virginia's largest universities positions itself to become a leader in rising sea levels as a result of - you guessed it, climate change and global warming. On the other hand, it IS comforting to know that there are some rational thinking residents in the Commonwealth - they just tend to not be Republicans. As we've noted before, eastern Virginia has huge problems facing it as sea levels rise as polar ice melts. Norfolk is a particularly vulnerable city as shown in the photo where million dollar homes have the tidal waters encroach them - the street is totally submerged - during a recent storm that coincided with high tide. Here are details from the Virginian Pilot:
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Old Dominion University plans to unveil an initiative Thursday to become a national hub for research, teaching and expertise in rising sea levels related to climate change.
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The directive from ODU President John R. Broderick comes as the Navy’s top oceanographer, Rear Adm. David Titley, is scheduled to speak Thursday night in Norfolk about the threats of climate change and how the Navy is preparing to cope with them.
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“We are forced to take very seriously the scientific evidence that predicts the ocean’s rise of 2 feet or more before the end of the century,” Broderick said. “It’s as if we live in a climate-science fishbowl here on the Virginia coast.” Given its swampy, low-lying nature and the fact that land is slowly sinking, Hampton Roads for years has been forecast to be the second-most vulnerable region to elevating seas on the East Coast and the Gulf of Mexico, behind only New Orleans.
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The reality is, coastal waters are rising – by between 15 and 17 inches over the past century – making shoreline areas more susceptible to storms, flooding and tidal surges.
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“We want to get more involved in this issue. And frankly, given our location in an urban, coastal environment, we’re in a unique position to do so.” ODU does not have a climate-change adaptation plan, Atkinson said, “but we’ll probably have to do that.” Titley, the Navy oceanographer, is scheduled to meet with ODU faculty and environmental experts involved in the initiative before his speech Thursday to go over Navy research.
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ODU grapples with reality while Kookinelli tries to make the world conform with his untethered lunacy. Blue Virginia has a related story here that looks at the problems Washington D.C. will face with rising sea levels.