Hurricanes are becoming more frequent and more severe.
Homes and industries on seafronts are at risk of flooding.
Orrin H. Pilkey looks at the subject and asks; why are we
still building in flood zones and where should we be
building instead? RETREAT FROM A RISING SEA would seem to
be his answer.
Orrin H. Pilkey grew up in a house which was flooded by
Hurricane Camille in 1969 and was destroyed by Hurricane
Katrina in 2005. House sites in that neighborhood are
still offered for sale. With Linda Pilkey-Jarvis and Keith
C Pilkey he has examined the probable loss, as they see it,
of vulnerable cities such as New Orleans and Miami, and the
preparedness of New York versus the Netherlands, much of
which land is already below sea level. People like to live
along coastlines and this makes trade convenient while
freeing up inland areas for farming. But our history shows
that the sea has been a source of danger. Japan
has 'tsunami stones' some six centuries old, placed to show
people a line below which it was unsafe to build. As
population increases around the world, more building has
occurred in risky areas. Beach protection measures have
been introduced, to prevent coastal erosion or to block the
removal of sand. But city managers and developers continue
to allow building in vulnerable zones while NASA scientists
measure the sea level as rising.
Refugees from rising water are already part of today's
news, with Arctic shorelines receding and Pacific islands
abandoned as the water table becomes salty. As deltas
become inundated, fertile land as well as homes and ports
will vanish, and the rest of the world's population will
have to make room, just when our water treatment centers,
landfills, hazardous storage facilities, nuclear plants,
harbors and industrial ports are threatened.
I'm pleased that the text explains terms which may be
unfamiliar to readers. Sea levels are measured by tidal
gauges and satellites. Even the gravitational pull of large
ice masses and water aquifers can now be measured. Local
sea level rise can be caused by the land subsiding as
freshwater or oil is extracted or the weight of a city
compresses its earth base. Global sea level rise has been
ongoing since the end of the last Ice Age but is now
occurring much faster, due to melting of freshwater ice -
the glaciers have all but gone and now the Arctic and
Antarctic ice sheets are melting. Good, long-term science
and reliable records are quoted throughout. Significant
paragraphs are highlighted.
The authors stress that vast amounts of money will be spent
on sea defenses and they believe this battle will not be
won. They propose moving communities and important heritage
collections sooner rather than later. Florida is a prime
example; sea walls would cut people off from the beaches,
while salinity in the water table will kill the trees and
make water undrinkable. Water will seep up through the
permeable limestone and storms will toss waves over the
walls to flood a city with salt water and sewage. New sea
walls are being built which protect large individual homes,
despite being unsightly, because wealthy people influence
property laws. The cost of saving Miami - with five million
residents, averaging six feet above sea level - will
prevent the saving of small communities. New Orleans
averages two feet below current sea level.
Suggestions given include raising buildings on pillars to
let the floods wash underneath, and turning parks and
underground parking into excess water storage. The Dutch,
who reclaimed their peaty land from the North Sea with
dykes, are protecting some areas and abandoning others.
Nature's ways of sopping up water, saltmarsh and peat bogs,
are being recognized as hugely valuable. But we need to
make long term infrastructure preparations now. Every storm
brings more lives lost, says the team.
Here in Dublin, one neighborhood was flooded in a storm
described as a 'once a century event'; this storm recurred
nine months later. The west of Ireland has been under water
for most of the 2015-16 winter, on the Shannon flood
plain; the sea is higher than in previous years, so the
river has nowhere to drain. Rural homes and businesses are
devastated despite towns having defenses and demount-able
river walls. The economic and human cost can only be
guessed at presently, with insurance companies refusing to
re-insure. I didn't need this confirmation that the 2016
book RETREAT FROM A RISING SEA is important. Case studies
include Norfolk, Virginia, where a neighborhood's roads
now go underwater at least twice a month and a Dutch
engineer has been hired to propose ways to hold back
Chesapeake Bay. This well-considered book packed with
strong evidence should be read by householders, city
managers, students of oceanography and anyone else with an
interest. Which will be most of us.
With its 28-foot storm surge and 174 mph winds, 2005's
Hurricane Katrina was responsible for nearly 2,000 deaths
and more than $100 billion in damage. The event was only a
preview of what will soon hit coastal communities as climate
change increases the power of storms that can lay waste to
critical infrastructure, such as water-treatment and energy
facilities, and create vast, irreversible pollution by
decimating landfills and toxic-waste sites. This
big-picture, policy-oriented book explains in gripping terms
what rising oceans will do to coastal cities and the drastic
actions we need to take now to remove vulnerable populations.
The authors detail specific threats faced by Miami, New
Orleans, New York, and Amsterdam. Aware of the overwhelming
social, political, and economic challenges that would
accompany effective action, they consider the burden to the
taxpayer and the logistics of moving landmarks and
infrastructure, including toxic-waste sites. They also show
readers the alternative: thousands of environmental
refugees, with no legitimate means to regain what they have
lost. The authors conclude with effective approaches for
addressing climate-change denialism and powerful arguments
for changing U.S. federal coastal-management policies.
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