Category:Florida

Sunshine state pol updates -- Some environmental Carl Hiaasen riffing on Florida's Gov Scott, and an e-bit of Clinton & Sanders from today's Miami Herald & TampaBay Times.

Clinton "mocked the Scott administration's directive to state employees not to use the words "climate change" and pledged to support renewable energy in Florida."

"Of Scott's order to state employees, she said: "I found this one hard to believe. I mean, you've just got to shake your head at that."

"When Republicans say they can't talk about climate change because they're not scientists, Clinston said, there's a cure for that: "Go talk to a scientist."

Sanders "also criticized Republicans for their obstinance on climate change, which he said is holding Florida back from becoming a leader in renewable energy."

"The state of Florida has an extraordinary natural resource: its called sunlight," Sanders said, "and this state should be a leader in the world in producing solar energy."

And from Florida, an Editorial re: political moves in the 'Sunshine State'... misnaming a constitutional amendment that would, in effect, *prevent sunshine/solar energy* from competing w/ the fossil fuel industry. The issue is now before the Court. Ivan Penn formerly w/ the St Pete Times, now w/ the LA Times, wrote extensively about energy issues in Florida. What a long-running story it is. Today's Tampa Bay Times Editorial speaks of the latest chapter of public good vs energy industry-lobbying power...

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Rising Seas: 'Florida is about to be ... transformed in the coming years'

"Take the six million people who live in south Florida today and divide them into two groups: those who live less than six and a half feet above the current high tide line, and everybody else."

“Sea level rise is not some distant problem in a distant place. As Elizabeth Rush shows, it’s affecting real people right now. Rising is a compelling piece of reporting, by turns bleak and beautiful.” ― Elizabeth Kolbert, author of The Sixth Extinction

“A smart, lyrical testament to change and uncertainty. Elizabeth Rush listens to both the vulnerability and resiliency of communities facing the shifting shorelines of extreme weather. These are the stories we need to hear in order to survive and live more consciously with a sharp-edged determination to face our future with empathy and resolve. Rising illustrates how climate change is a relentless truth and real people in real places know it by name, storm by flood by fire.” ― Terry Tempest Williams, author of The Hour of Land

Read "Rising: Dispatches from the New American Shore"

-- by Elizabeth Rush

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Via Tampa Bay Times

Report: 40 percent of Florida property will be ‘highly exposed’ to flooding

One of Florida’s biggest draws is also one if its biggest liabilities — its coastline. A new report projects that Florida is at the greatest risk of any state for tidal flooding caused by rising sea levels. And Tampa Bay faces some of the greatest risk within the Sunshine State.

According to a Monday report by the Union of Concerned Scientists, nearly 40 percent of the state’s property tax base is expected to be "highly exposed" to such flooding within the next 30 years.

By 2045, nearly 64,000 residential properties in the state — worth about $26 billion— are at risk for constant flooding. By 2100, about 1 million properties — worth $351 billion — will be at risk. ("You better hope I’m wrong about flood insurance" -- John Romano / Tampa Bay Times: ) "Once market risk perceptions catch up with reality, the potential drop in Florida’s coastal property values could have reverberations throughout the economy — affecting banks, insurers, investors, and developers — potentially triggering regional housing market crises."

Mapping Sea-level Rise in Florida

Coastal Risk Consultants, which raised $2 million to develop software to evaluate individual parcels for flooding, is on the cusp of profitability, said President Albert Slap.

“I just think as a practical matter, this is something people should do,” said homebuyer Kevin Kennedy, who ordered four reports from Coastal Risk Consulting on Palm Beach County properties along the Intracoastal and on the ocean. “The results discouraged me from purchasing two of them.”

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Underwater: Rising Seas, Chronic Floods, and the Implications for US Coastal Real Estate

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May 2018

"The "living shoreline" is the best defense against sea-level rise."

-- Jack E. Davis, author of "The Gulf: The Making of An American Sea

Follow Hashtag #Resilience on Twitter

Miami

The Water Will Come by Jeff Goodell

Miami Herald / by John Englander / We all have to rise to combat the rising tides

RMS.com / Risk Modeling & Catastrophe / We need to price #climate risk into all decision making

Tampa Bay

Tampa Bay Regional Planning Council / Climate Research

"The Cost of Doing Nothing: Economic Impacts of Sea-Level Rise in the Tampa Bay Area"

Three newspapers confront one challenge:

Sea-level rise is real, South Florida needs all hands on deck — now

MIAMI HERALD EDITORIAL BOARD

May 04, 2018

No graver threat faces the future of South Florida than the accelerating pace of sea-level rise. In the past century, the sea has risen 9 inches in Key West. In the past 23 years, it’s risen 3 inches. By 2060, it’s predicted to rise another 2 feet, with no sign of slowing down.

Think about that. Water levels could easily be 2 feet higher in 40 years. And scientists say that’s a conservative estimate. Because of melting ice sheets and how oceans circulate, there’s a chance South Florida’s sea level could be 3 feet higher by 2060 and as much as 8 feet by 2100, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

It’s not just a matter of how much land we’re going to lose, though the barrier islands and low-lying communities will be largely uninhabitable once the ocean rises by 3 feet. It’s a matter of what can be saved. And elsewhere, how we’re going to manage the retreat...

Here's how rising seas could swallow up these coastal cities

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Twitter / Miami sea level rise

April 2018

Miami / Miami Beach, a Race Against Time

Via Fortune / Wall Street Journal / Real Estate - Climate Change

Climate Change Is Already Depressing the Price of Flood-Prone Real Estate

Rising Sea Levels Reshape Miami’s Housing Market

Properties on the coast now trade at discounts as flood waters and ‘king tides’ damp enthusiasm for oceanfront living.

New research shows that real estate properties in areas affected by extreme weather and sea level rise are losing value relative to less exposed properties. The effects are already substantial, but they may point to a looming collapse as climate change makes coastal communities untenable.

Work by Harvard researchers published last week and highlighted by the Wall Street Journal finds that, after accounting for an array of other factors, home prices have appreciated more slowly in lower-lying areas of Miami-Dade County, particularly Miami Beach. A broader study using data from Zillow, still under peer review, found that properties exposed to rising sea levels sell at a 7% discount to comparable properties not subject to climate-related risk.

As many as 13% of Americans are still convinced climate change isn’t happening at all, and 30% are confident that humans play no role in it. But real estate prices now seem to confirm the chestnut attributed to author Philip K. Dick: “Reality is that which, when you stop believing in it, doesn’t go away.”

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Yale.edu / Why Seas Are Rising Faster on U.S. East Coast

Along the southeastern coast of the U.S., researchers have zeroed in on three factors that have made this shoreline a regional hot spot of sea-level rise. They include a slowing Gulf Stream, shifts in a major North Atlantic weather pattern, and the effects of El Niño climate cycles.

“These coastal areas are more vulnerable than they realize to short-term rapid acceleration of sea-level rise,” says Andrea Dutton, a University of Florida geologist who studies the history of sea-level fluctuations. “If they’re hanging their hat on sea level rise projections looking at the potential over decades, they need to refocus and think about the potential for short-term variability in that rate.”

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Sea-level Rise Now and Tomorrow

The ground under the cities of South Florida is largely porous limestone, which means water will eventually rise up through it.

“Our underlying geology is like Swiss cheese...”

-- Mayor Philip Levine, running for Florida Governor

March 2018

Scientists continue to study the questions that need to be asked

https://eos.org/research-spotlights/incorporating-physical-processes-into-sea-level-projections

When projecting future sea levels, scientists have traditionally relied upon physical models and expert assessments to project the polar ice sheets’ response to various emission scenarios. These approaches, however, haven’t taken into account some physical processes that can quickly increase ice sheet discharge, such as the collapse of terminal ice cliffs and the breakup of floating ice shelves caused by a process known as hydrofracturing.

Now Robert Kopp et al. have integrated both of these processes into a probability-based modeling framework to explore how they could affect future projections of global and local sea level changes. The results indicate that these mechanisms could significantly raise sea level forecasts for high-emission scenarios, including nearly doubling the median projections of 21st century global mean sea level rise by 2100.

January/February 2018