Global Change and Our Common Future Papers from a Forum (1989) / Chapter Skim
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13. Impacts of Future Sea Level Rise
13. Impacts of Future Sea Level Rise
Pages 125-138
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From page 125... ...
and lead to sea level rises throughout the world (UNEP, 1986; Titus, 1986; Robin, 1987~. Before discussing the status of current efforts to estimate the impacts of future sea level change, it is useful to consider a dozen brief observations that condition the exercise.
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From page 126... ...
rising local relative sea level at Baltimore on North American East Coast and (b) falling local relative sea level at Stockholm in Scandinavia, as the land rises in "rebound" from weight of receding glaciers.
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From page 127... ...
In market economies, property values of land provide a workable approximation of the present value of the future flow of economic services supplied exclusively by the land. Property values can thus be used in estimating the value of projected land loss.
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From page 128... ...
FIGURE 13.4 Cape Cod house tumbles into the sea in 1988 after a break in offshore barrier spit increased shoreline eros10n at ChaLham, Massachusetts. (Courtesy of Cape Cod Times.)
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Higher discount rates depress the estimated cost of future sea level impacts. Lower discount rates make them appear larger.
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EPA estimates suggest, for example, that up to 61 percent of the nation's wetlands might be lost to a 50-cm sea level rise if all coastal dry land were defended, while as little as 20 percent would be sacrificed if only densely developed areas were protected (Table 13.1~. Most attempts to assess the economic impact of future sea level rise employ a kind of "coloring book" approach.
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From page 131... ...
FIGURE 13.6 Inundation scenarios, superimposing 1-m, 3-m, and 4-m relative sea level rises on population density for the Nile Delta, Egypt (Milkman et al., 1989~. The scenarios are usually selected from a range of projections that have been developed on the basis of crude models of the relationship between atmospheric temperature and sea level change (Figure 13.7~.
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From page 132... ...
For example, moving from a 3 percent discount rate to a TO percent discount rate reduces the higher Charleston cost estimate of $2.6 billion to a mere $68 million.
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From page 133... ...
attempted an estimate for national losses to future sea level rise, using a scenario of a 760-cm (25-ft) rise by the year 2130.
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From page 134... ...
Using strong but reasonable parametric assumptions (discount rate equals economic growth rate, most of the productive land inundated is agricultural, agricultural rents are a modest proportion of total agricultural output, and absent mitigating responses) , it was estimated that a "worstcase" relative sea level rise of 1 m by 2050 could impose a cumulative loss in present-value terms of roughly $0.5 billion in both Bangladesh and Egypt (Broadus, 1989~.
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From page 135... ...
The immensity of our uncertainty about future sea level change should not be understated, and a sustained commitment of effort and resources is required to maintain our progress in reducing that uncertainty. Like the children in a flooded Boston of a century past, we are still going to school (Figure 13.8~.
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1984. Greenhouse Effect and Sea Level Rise.
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1989. Global sea level rise and the greenhouse effect: Might they be connected?
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1986. Coastal erosion and sea level rise: Implications for ocean beach and San Francisco's westside transport project.
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