16 thoughts on “Snapshots of Miami Sea Level Rise”
This flooding has zero to do with ocean rise. It is caused by land subsidence due to diversion of surface water to build all those roads and buildings and over pumping of ground water to water all those lawns and keep the toilets working. Miami actually has an agency which is supposed to regulate the problem.
Thomas, I know in your blinkered and bigoted mind all foreigners are raving leftists, including and especially bodies like the United Nations, but even on the opposite side of the world we are slowly coming to terms with the fact oceans are rising due to expansion and melt. And now is the time to take action, not to deny it is happening. Wake up and make yourself useful. Popular Mechanics warned about it way back in 1912.
“Councils are going to be told not to build or approve developments or structures lower than 1.9 metres above the high tide mark under new advice on rising sea levels.
It’s a half-metre increase on the Ministry for the Environment’s previous advice a decade ago, based on new information showing sea levels will rise faster than anticipated.
The detail – and other new guidance for councils – emerged in a briefing document provided to a regional council and gives an insight into the Ministry’s delayed official guidance to local government which was meant to be published last year.”
It also refers to “retreat” as a planning option for areas facing an encroaching ocean – a step that would see land surrendered to the tide and communities potentially relocated.
http://e360.yale.edu/features/how-rising-seas-and-coastal-storms-drowned-us-flood-insurance-program
Some quotes from this article, about the National Flood Insurance Program: “Today, the NFIP is effectively bankrupt. It owes the U.S. Treasury nearly $25 billion… No one expects that money to be repaid… it is only a matter of time until the next big storm drains the coffers again… the NFIP has improbably subsidized thousands of risky properties along the coast… by charging them below-market premiums.”
Coastal storm payments by NFIP have gone from 78% of their total, since 1978, to 91% of their total, since 2000. This is almost certainly a reflection of SLR.
More quotes: “Today, at least $3 trillion worth of property lines the Atlantic and Gulf coasts. Much of it is insured by the NFIP… the real estate firm Zillow found that nearly two million U.S.homes worth almost $900 billion could be underwater by 2100. The researchers weren’t referring to a situation where the market value of a home dips below the value of the mortgage; they literally meant underwater”
People opposed to climate action don’t want their taxes raised to combat SLR. I wonder, whose money do they think it is funding the NFIP?
There was a (pretty sensible, I thought) effort to push more of the financial responsibility of having homes and businesses in high risk flood zones onto the owners and their towns. This was met with a howl of protest, which is really ironic (and hypocritical) for people who don’t like having federal taxes raised, or don’t like big government.
That rise in fees was both reduced and slowed, and it is still true that if someone wants to rebuild exactly where they were before, while they might need to raise the home higher, the cost of their town to restore utilities, including sewer and water, remains fully reimbursed by the federal dime.
It is estimated, according to my notes from an Environmental Business Council meeting on 15 Nov 2016, with Ned Bartlett and Kathleen Theoharides from the Commonwealth’s Governor’s EEOR, and engineer Dan Stapleton, from GZA GeoEnvironmental, that federal disaster payouts by 2025 will be $30 billion per annum. See interesting discussion about climate change effects upon budget, and that seems conservative, given that current projections put payouts for hurricane damange at just shy of $30 billion per annum in the 2020s. The federal gov’t also pays out for crop insurance. These are both portions of the budget which, according to present law, for which Congress cannot reduce allocations.
Good information, thanks. Many of us are so busy trying to defend the Science that we don’t look at ways to summarize the Consequences. As such, we yield that ‘high ground’ to the well-funded deniers who, of course, have grossly inflated the cost of ‘going green’ to ‘moving-into-a-cave’ territory. But the Consequences are there, they have costs, those costs are now growing and, given the nature of this problem, will grow exponentially and, thanks to the sheer mass of the oceans, with blatant disregard to human actions for decades after those actions are undertaken.
And it’s not only coastal areas that will need to watch out and dig deep into their pockets . . .
“Climate change is often seen as posing the greatest risk to coastal areas. But the nation’s inland cities face perils of their own, including more intense storms and more frequent flooding.”
This flooding has zero to do with ocean rise. It is caused by land subsidence due to diversion of surface water to build all those roads and buildings and over pumping of ground water to water all those lawns and keep the toilets working. Miami actually has an agency which is supposed to regulate the problem.
Not true at all. Bates. As you very well know.
https://www.yaleclimateconnections.org/2017/02/flooding-is-the-new-normal-in-miami/
this is why it’s good to talk to geophysicists who have spent their lives studying the issue rather than repeating info from jackasswithablog.com
Thomas, I know in your blinkered and bigoted mind all foreigners are raving leftists, including and especially bodies like the United Nations, but even on the opposite side of the world we are slowly coming to terms with the fact oceans are rising due to expansion and melt. And now is the time to take action, not to deny it is happening. Wake up and make yourself useful. Popular Mechanics warned about it way back in 1912.
“Councils are going to be told not to build or approve developments or structures lower than 1.9 metres above the high tide mark under new advice on rising sea levels.
It’s a half-metre increase on the Ministry for the Environment’s previous advice a decade ago, based on new information showing sea levels will rise faster than anticipated.
The detail – and other new guidance for councils – emerged in a briefing document provided to a regional council and gives an insight into the Ministry’s delayed official guidance to local government which was meant to be published last year.”
It also refers to “retreat” as a planning option for areas facing an encroaching ocean – a step that would see land surrendered to the tide and communities potentially relocated.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=11868570
NOAA recently raised the ‘worst case scenario’ for sea level by 2100 to 8 feet (from 6 feet). A decade ago this value was more like 3 feet.
Actually, y’need to be quantitative about this. The sinking due to all contributions is measurable. At Palm Beach, for instance (see ftp://www.ngs.noaa.gov/cors/Plots/Longterm/pbch_08.long.png) is just slightly negative, less than 1 mm per annum. In contrast, sea level rise relative to that, due primarily to heating and consequent expansion of oceans (see https://tidesandcurrents.noaa.gov/sltrends/sltrends_station.shtml?stnid=8722670) is 3.7 mm per annum.
Tommy Poo,
It has been over a year since I debunked your lies about NASA/GISS. When are you going to retract those lies and apologize for them?
Tommy Poo,
Instead of voting my post down, why don’t you man up and apologize for telling lies about NASA/GISS?
He’s just sore that his house is being confiscated by the government via eminent domain to be torn down and transformed into a new wetland area:
https://youtu.be/FadyWlTdi2Y
Reblogged this on AGR Daily News Service.
Florida plans to abandon Property to the Sea (Sea Level Rise)
Lol – I just posted this, then scrolled down and saw you posted it too…
http://e360.yale.edu/features/how-rising-seas-and-coastal-storms-drowned-us-flood-insurance-program
Some quotes from this article, about the National Flood Insurance Program: “Today, the NFIP is effectively bankrupt. It owes the U.S. Treasury nearly $25 billion… No one expects that money to be repaid… it is only a matter of time until the next big storm drains the coffers again… the NFIP has improbably subsidized thousands of risky properties along the coast… by charging them below-market premiums.”
Coastal storm payments by NFIP have gone from 78% of their total, since 1978, to 91% of their total, since 2000. This is almost certainly a reflection of SLR.
More quotes: “Today, at least $3 trillion worth of property lines the Atlantic and Gulf coasts. Much of it is insured by the NFIP… the real estate firm Zillow found that nearly two million U.S.homes worth almost $900 billion could be underwater by 2100. The researchers weren’t referring to a situation where the market value of a home dips below the value of the mortgage; they literally meant underwater”
People opposed to climate action don’t want their taxes raised to combat SLR. I wonder, whose money do they think it is funding the NFIP?
There was a (pretty sensible, I thought) effort to push more of the financial responsibility of having homes and businesses in high risk flood zones onto the owners and their towns. This was met with a howl of protest, which is really ironic (and hypocritical) for people who don’t like having federal taxes raised, or don’t like big government.
That rise in fees was both reduced and slowed, and it is still true that if someone wants to rebuild exactly where they were before, while they might need to raise the home higher, the cost of their town to restore utilities, including sewer and water, remains fully reimbursed by the federal dime.
It is estimated, according to my notes from an Environmental Business Council meeting on 15 Nov 2016, with Ned Bartlett and Kathleen Theoharides from the Commonwealth’s Governor’s EEOR, and engineer Dan Stapleton, from GZA GeoEnvironmental, that federal disaster payouts by 2025 will be $30 billion per annum. See interesting discussion about climate change effects upon budget, and that seems conservative, given that current projections put payouts for hurricane damange at just shy of $30 billion per annum in the 2020s. The federal gov’t also pays out for crop insurance. These are both portions of the budget which, according to present law, for which Congress cannot reduce allocations.
Good information, thanks. Many of us are so busy trying to defend the Science that we don’t look at ways to summarize the Consequences. As such, we yield that ‘high ground’ to the well-funded deniers who, of course, have grossly inflated the cost of ‘going green’ to ‘moving-into-a-cave’ territory. But the Consequences are there, they have costs, those costs are now growing and, given the nature of this problem, will grow exponentially and, thanks to the sheer mass of the oceans, with blatant disregard to human actions for decades after those actions are undertaken.
And it’s not only coastal areas that will need to watch out and dig deep into their pockets . . .
“Climate change is often seen as posing the greatest risk to coastal areas. But the nation’s inland cities face perils of their own, including more intense storms and more frequent flooding.”
http://www.detroitnews.com/story/news/nation/2017/06/11/high-water-bridges-climate-change/102723106/