North Carolina among most at risk to rising seas


From The Charlotte Observer, 1/21/09:
http://www.charlotteobserver.com/breaking/story/485417.html

N.C. among most at risk to rising seas

Erosion combined with rising water levels could reach a point that
some barrier islands break apart.

By Wade Rawlins


With its long low coastline and large land area less than two feet
above sea level, North Carolina is among the states most vulnerable to
sea-level rise, a new federal report warns.

The new report focuses on the coastal states from North Carolina to
New York where the rates of sea level rise are moderately high.

The region has extensive coastal development, a high population and is
likely to be at increased risk.

After Florida and Louisiana, North Carolina and Texas have the largest
land areas threatened by sea-level rise.

?You're vulnerable,? said Jim Titus, project manager for sea-level
rise for the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and lead author of
the report, ?Coastal Sensitivity to Sea Level Rise: A Focus on the
Mid-Atlantic Region.?

?The people whose land could be permanently submerged aren't even
flooded today.?

A rise in sea level increases the vulnerability of development in
coastal floodplains and diminishes the rate at which low-lying areas
drain.

It will result in a loss of wetlands in the mid-Atlantic.

Rising temperatures cause ocean waters to warm and expand, like water
heated in a tea kettle.

In addition, rising temperatures near the poles cause massive ice
sheets to melt, adding to the volume of water.

The report predicts that coastal erosion will occur at higher rates as
sea level rises.

Particularly in the sandy shore of the mid-Atlantic coast, the report
says, it is nearly certain that barrier islands, spits and coastal
headlands will erode faster due to sea-level rise.

The Outer Banks are particularly vulnerable.

The report, produced by a collaboration among agencies including the
U.S. Geological Survey, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric
Administration and the Department of Transportation, offers three
scenarios for sea-level rise by 2100: A rise of about 16 inches; of
about two feet, and of about three feet.

In 2007, an international scientific panel projected that sea level
would likely rise between 7 inches and two feet by 2100.

Those estimates do not take into account any contribution from rapid
changes in ice flow from Antarctica or Greenland.

Rising sea levels might be especially disastrous to North Carolina, as
some sections of the coast are slowly sinking, magnifying the effects
of rising seas.

Tide-gauge readings in the mid-Atlantic indicate that relative sea
level rise (the combination of rising waters and sinking land) was
generally higher ? by about a foot ? than the global average during
the 20th century.

If sea level should rise more than three feet during the 21st century,
the report says, ?it is likely that some barrier islands in this
region will cross a threshold? destabilizing and breaking apart.

Rob Young, director of the Program for the Study of Developed
Shorelines at Western Carolina University, said the report underscored
that sea-level rise is a real management concern.

?There is some very important stuff in here that North Carolinians
should take seriously,? said Young, who said state policy-makers and
coastal communities should use a three-foot sea level rise by 2100 as
a target.

?Whether sea level is rising is not something scientists argue about
it,? Young said.

?It is. It's different than an argument about whether humans are
causing global warming. We have directly measured an acceleration ?
over the last two decades.?

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Harry
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