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Where America's climate migrants will go as sea level rises

citylab.com

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Re: Where America's climate migrants will go as sea level rises

#12
> In the worst-case scenario, in which sea levels rise by six feet by 2100, ...

Where does six feet come from?

It seems very suspicious. It contradicts NOAA Sea Level Trends data of tide gauge measurements, going back to 1930 and sometimes earlier. According to the map, in almost all places in US the projected sea level trend is no more than 1-1.5 feet by 2100:

https://tidesandcurrents.noaa.gov/sltrends/sltrends.html

What is more, the trend is clearly linear from the start of the measurement. The trend hasn't changed in recent years.

For example, see data from the gauge in Sandy Hook, New Jersey, from 1932: "The relative sea level trend is 4.09 millimeters/year with a 95% confidence interval of +/- 0.2 mm/yr based on monthly mean sea level data from 1932 to 2018 which is equivalent to a change of 1.34 feet in 100 years."

https://tidesandcurrents.noaa.gov/sltrends/sltrends_station....

Gauge in Lewes, Delaware, data from 1919: "The relative sea level trend is 3.48 millimeters/year with a 95% confidence interval of +/- 0.23 mm/yr based on monthly mean sea level data from 1919 to 2018 which is equivalent to a change of 1.14 feet in 100 years."

https://tidesandcurrents.noaa.gov/sltrends/sltrends_station....

Re: Where America's climate migrants will go as sea level rises

#13
post #3

I find it hilarious that even in a worse scenario with the climate crisis, Chicago somehow did not get any migrants .

On the map shades of red indicate above average immigration. White is unspecified so some meaning of avaerage; not none, but average.

That said I have basically the same question. Why are cities not getting above average immigration? You noticed Chicago, I noticed Buffalo and Rochester, which are the #2 and #3 largest cities in NY.

Re: Where America's climate migrants will go as sea level rises

#14
It seems really unintuitive to me that there is enough ice on the globe to raise the sea level by 6 feet (let alone 230). But then if I had to guess the land area of Antarctica, I would have estimated something the size of Oklahoma or Texas (when Antarctica is 40% larger than the USA)

Re: Where America's climate migrants will go as sea level rises

#15
In the free market of ideas, no one actually believes this will happen.

Just look at coastal real estate. Buyers and lenders would have to be colossal fools to pay such premiums to be waterfront. Even Obama just plunked down 12M on a waterfront mansion on the low lying island of MV.

Re: Where America's climate migrants will go as sea level rises

#16
post #12

> In the worst-case scenario, in which sea levels rise by six feet by 2100, ... Where does six feet come from? It seems very suspicious. It contradicts NOAA Sea Level Trends data of tide gauge measurements, going back to 1930 and sometimes earlier. According to the map, in almost all places in US the projected sea level trend is no more than 1-1.5 feet by 2100: https://tidesandcurrents.noaa.gov/sltrends/sltrends.html…

You can’t just eyeball these graphs and assume the trend is linear: https://tamino.wordpress.com/2019/10/09/sea-level-accelerati...

See also https://tamino.wordpress.com/2019/10/14/sea-level-accelerati...

Re: Where America's climate migrants will go as sea level rises

#17

I find it hard to imagine 200k people leaving San Mateo County. most of the county is above 6ft elevation, and there's just so much money I would think dikes could be built to keep the flats dry. At the worst I would expect more housing to be built in the hills.

What's interesting is that many of the tech offices are actually adjacent to the bay (eg. Facebook's Menlo Park campus, Google's Mountain View and Sunnyvale campuses, Microsoft and Amazon buildings, NetApp, etc.) and in floodable areas [0].

It's not clear whether those companies would invest in dikes or just move somewhere else, but I'd assume the former.

[0] https://msc.fema.gov/portal/search and search for "1 Hacker Way, Menlo Park, CA", "1600 Amphitheatre Parkway, Mountain View, CA" or "1170 Bordeaux drive, Sunnyvale, CA"

Re: Where America's climate migrants will go as sea level rises

#18
post #12

> In the worst-case scenario, in which sea levels rise by six feet by 2100, ... Where does six feet come from? It seems very suspicious. It contradicts NOAA Sea Level Trends data of tide gauge measurements, going back to 1930 and sometimes earlier. According to the map, in almost all places in US the projected sea level trend is no more than 1-1.5 feet by 2100: https://tidesandcurrents.noaa.gov/sltrends/sltrends.html…

[deleted]

Re: Where America's climate migrants will go as sea level rises

#19

It seems really unintuitive to me that there is enough ice on the globe to raise the sea level by 6 feet (let alone 230). But then if I had to guess the land area of Antarctica, I would have estimated something the size of Oklahoma or Texas (when Antarctica is 40% larger than the USA)

A chunk of it is thermal expansion and the fact that CO2 is being absorbed in

Re: Where America's climate migrants will go as sea level rises

#20
post #12

> In the worst-case scenario, in which sea levels rise by six feet by 2100, ... Where does six feet come from? It seems very suspicious. It contradicts NOAA Sea Level Trends data of tide gauge measurements, going back to 1930 and sometimes earlier. According to the map, in almost all places in US the projected sea level trend is no more than 1-1.5 feet by 2100: https://tidesandcurrents.noaa.gov/sltrends/sltrends.html…

I was looking for the same, it appears to come from (or be reflected) at least here:

https://cpo.noaa.gov/sites/cpo/Reports/2012/NOAA_SLR_r3.pdf

Where a SLR of 2m by 2100 is reported as an extreme scenario, presumably (but I can't find it in the text) with very low confidence. They give the following definition of the reasons for the low confidence rating, though: "Inconclusive evidence (limited sources, extrapolations, inconsistent findings, poor documentation and/or methods not tested, etc.), disagreement or lack of opinions among experts".

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