Louisiana Coast Faces Highest Rate Of Sea-Level Rise Worldwide - thelensnola.org

[WillyT]

New research: Louisiana coast faces highest rate of sea-level rise worldwide
By Bob Marshall, Staff writer - thelensnola.org
February 21, 2013 10:54am


Port Fourchon experienced serious flooding from Hurricane Ike, which made landfall in Galveston, Texas in 2008. Scientists say such flooding will become more common, even in smaller storms, as the coast sinks and sea level rises.

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Stunning new data not yet publicly released shows Louisiana losing its battle with rising seas much more quickly than even the most pessimistic studies have predicted to date.

While state officials continue to argue over restoration projects to save the state’s sinking, crumbling coast, top researchers at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration have concluded that Louisiana is in line for the highest rate of sea-level rise “on the planet.” * Indeed, the water is rising so fast that some coastal restoration projects could be obsolete before they are completed, the officials said.

NOAA’s Tim Osborne, an 18-year veteran of Louisiana coastal surveys, and Steve Gill, senior scientist at the agency’s Center for Operational Oceanographic Products and Services, spelled out the grim reality in interviews with The Lens. When new data on the rate of coastal subsidence is married with updated projections of sea-level rise, the southeast corner of Louisiana looks likely to be under at least 4.3 feet of gulf water by the end of the century.

That rate could swamp projects in the state’s current coastal Master Plan, which incorporated worst-case scenarios for relative sea-level rise calculated two years ago— which the new figures now make out-of-date. (The state’s estimates of sea-level rise and subsidence are listed on page 83 of the Master Plan.)

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More: http://thelensnola.org/2013/02/21/new-research-louisiana-coast-faces-highest-rate-of-sea-level-rise-on-the-planet/#

[Hekate]

1. Either get with the Dutch program, or goodbye NOLA

This is so sad.

[WillyT]

2. Yep...

[RobertEarl]

6. Sea walls?

The coast of Louisiana, due to it being in the delta of the Mississippi river is a fecund place. Walling it off will destroy that. Better that the humans move back and allow the natural world its power to repair and recover and transform the coast so that it remains a life giving and self sustaining region.

We have this saying: Water always wins. No use fighting it. Best to get out of its way.

[WillyT]

3. Kick !!!

[FarCenter]

4. The sea level isn't rising faster in Louisiana than anywhere else

Louisiani is unique in how fast the land level is sinking.

Southeast Louisiana fares much worse in all four scenarios because “we now know the entire area is sinking faster than any coastal landscape its size on the planet,” Osborne said.

[WillyT]

5. Six Of One, Half A Dozen Of Another..

[FarCenter]

7. Sea level rise is usually associated with global warming, but that's not the case in Louisiana

In Louisiana, the land is sinking faster than the sea level is rising.

[chase48]

8. Reality check to Dumb OK senator Jim Inhofe on Global warming

The sea is rising and the summers are getting so hot in OK last summer that they issued warnings for the elderly they could die of heart attacks if exposed to the heat as one here in my town died because his electric was turned off because he couldn't afford the bill, this summer will be worst than the last summer, my ten acres of trees are dying off in groves, vegetables will not grow here, they don't bear fruit, I haven't been able to grow a tomato in three summers, you would not want to invest in property along any coast line, Google You Tube's "Too Hot Not To Handle" and that will scare the shit out of you!!