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Not to beat up unfairly on Marco Rubio, but given his home state's vulnerability to rising sea levels, one has to wonder how he expects to get reelected to the U.S. Senate much less run for president of the United States. A piece at
The Raw Story looks at what sea level rise may mean for many of America's largest cities. It's not pretty. Here are highlights:
New research indicates that climate change has already triggered an
unstoppable decay
of the West Antarctic Ice Sheet. The projected decay will lead to at
least 4 feet of accelerating global sea level rise within the next
two-plus centuries, and at least 10 feet of rise in the end.
What does the U.S. look like
with an ocean that is 10 feet higher? The radically transformed map
would lose 28,800 square miles of land, home today to 12.3 million
people.
More than half of the area of 40 large cities (population over 50,000) is less than 10 feet above the high tide line, from Virginia Beach and Miami (the largest affected), down to Hoboken, N.J. (smallest).
Twenty-seven of the cities are in Florida, where one-third of all
current housing sits below the critical line — including 85 percent in
Miami-Dade and
Broward
counties. Each of these counties is more threatened than any whole
state outside of Florida – and each sits on bedrock filled with holes,
rendering defense by seawalls or levees almost impossible.
By the metric of most people living on land less than 10 ft above the high tide line,
New York City is most threatened in the long run, with a low-lying population count of more than 700,000. Sixteen other cities, including
New Orleans, La.;
Norfolk, Va.;
Stockton, Calif.;
Boston, Mass.;
St. Petersburg, Fla.; and
Jacksonville, Fla.;
are on the list of places with more than 100,000 people below the line.
(Much of New Orleans is already below sea level, but is protected at
today’s level by levees.)
Climate Central’s enhanced analysis paints a much more detailed pictured for completed states. For example, more than 32,000 miles of road and $950 billion of property currently sit on affected land in Florida. Threatened property in New York and New Jersey totals more than $300 billion.
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| St. Petersburg, Forida |
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