Bacon's Rebellion

Democracy Thrives in Sunlight

Nash Nails Neanderthal GOP

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by

Peter Galuszka
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crabbersBy Peter Galuszka

Imagine Norfolk spending $300 million for light rail only to have it covered in salt water. Or consider that Virginia’s statewide mean temperature has risen 0.46 degrees Fahrenheit per decade since 1975. Or that, due to carbon dioxide emissions, the sea level on the Virginia coast is expected to rise by two feet by 2050 and by 5.6 feet by 2100.

And consider that the state’s Republican politicians are mostly sticking their heads in the rising tide about climate change.

That’s the point of an intriguing essay in the Local Opinions section of this morning’s Washington Post by Stephen P. Nash, a research scholar and former journalism professor at the University of Richmond. His book on the rising water and climate change involving Virginia is due out this fall.

As Nash correctly explains, the state’s GOP leadership takes a “ho-hum” attitude about climate change and is loath to accept the fact of what is happening around them. You hear a lot of the echos on this very blog.

Nash is absolutely right. He should be listened to. As he points out,what is especially odd is that today’s deniers are running contrary to the traditions of their own Republican Party which gave us Theodore Roosevelt who set aside great expanses of land for preservation. Even Richard Nixon proved to be one of the most influential environment protectors in modern U.S. history.

I did a piece last year quoting scientists about how fishing patterns are already changing for Virginia’s watermen due to climate change.

Do the sea creatures know something that the GOP House of Delegates doesn’t know? Most likely they do.

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34 responses to “Nash Nails Neanderthal GOP”

  1. larryg Avatar
    larryg

    Well, not even FEMA can convince SOME people of the realities…:

    ” QUINCY – A group of Wollaston residents say the federal government is abusing coastal neighborhoods with its controversial new flood maps.
    “Here I am at 60 years old looking towards creating debt that I will likely die with,” Carol Themmen of Dickens Street said. “The federal government now has my only true asset in their hands. In what I see as a mismanagement of power, I am left fearful and afraid of my future.”

    Themmen was one of four residents from the Beechwood Knoll neighborhood, in the eastern section of Wollaston, who spoke out against the flood maps proposed by the Federal Emergency Management Agency during a public hearing Tuesday night. FEMA’s Norfolk County maps are scheduled to take effect June 9, and individual communities must adopt the changes before then or they will be ineligible to receive flood insurance.

    The city’s planning board voted to the new map for Quincy after Tuesday’s public hearing, and the city council will vote next Monday. Joseph Shea, son of City Clerk Joseph Shea and senior vice president of Woodard & Curran, the engineering firm hired by the city to do a flood-map study, has recommended that officials adopt the map by June 9 to keep the city eligible for flood insurance and FEMA grants.

    “There is a fairly strong downside to not adopting the maps,” Shea said.
    He said the city is applying for map revisions through FEMA in an effort to bring relief to many of Quincy’s affected neighborhoods.

    Beechwood Knoll residents protesting the new Quincy map have formed a group called Quincy Coalition Making Waves. Richard Joyce, a member from Havilend Street, said the new map will cost him at least $2,200 in flood-insurance costs per year and devalue his home.

    John Risitano of Dickens Street blasted the federal government, saying FEMA is trying to replenish its depleted disaster-relief accounts on the backs of coastal residents whose properties have never become flooded.
    “The cost of disaster assistance should be the entire country’s obligation, not just those living at or near the coast,” he said.”

    see where this is going for the GOP/FAUX News folks?

    let’s see.. FEMA has become part of the global warming conspiracy to punish people economically , right?

    makes me wonder if our coastal areas are going to turn into watery versions of Detroit when the insurance companies pull out and people abandon properties they cannot insure … and don’t want to pay the mortgages.

    but there could be an upside – there’s going to be a lot of under-structure parking created!

  2. mshapiro Avatar
    mshapiro

    I’m pretty sure that 5.6ft number is for the Norfolk region, and from a WaPo article, and most of that is from relative sea level change from the land sinking, not from carbon emissions. We could drop world wide carbon emissions to zero and it wouldn’t do much of anything to save Hampton Roads.

    And correct me if I’m wrong, but there isn’t a proposal that exists outside complete de-industrialization of a few countries or killing off a few billion people that is going to reduce our emissions to the point where we can actually reverse the process we’ve started.

    1. larryg Avatar
      larryg

      re: subsistence

      so what explains the rest of the East Coast?

      is it all subsistence or just this area?

      re: killing billions..

      well, for the sake of argument – if burning nat gas instead of coal and pursuing newer nuke technology might reduce the carbon – why is that not worth pursuing similar to what we did with CFCs for the Ozone holes?

      I can see skepticism – but I can’t understand why we’d bet the farm that absolutely nothing will happen that we can effect..

      what if we took that approach with CFCs?

    2. LifeOnTheFallLine Avatar
      LifeOnTheFallLine

      Your political hipster nihlism is recognized. The sun is going to burn out in a few billion years and then after that the universe will expand into a cold collection of proton gas clouds devoid of heat or light so let’s just not do anything.

      I seem to remember the sky similarly was going to fall if we tried to regulate lead or sulfurs or CFCs or child labor or the work week or the minimum wage and yet there it remains, blue and beautiful above our heads.

  3. mshapiro Avatar
    mshapiro

    The whole Chesapeake Bay region I believe is seeing more see level rise from subsistence than from a change in volume of the ocean/bay. I’m not saying sea level isn’t rising from climate change, IE eustatic sea level rise, just that from a policy standpoint, its a flat out lie to say reducing carbon emissions is going to do anything to mitigate sea level rise in Hampton Roads.

    As for your other question, I definitely think we should be reducing carbon emissions for a number of reasons like air/water quality and to a certain extent climate change. But to use scare tactics and act like anything we are going to do will actually solve the problem is just ridiculous. Our climate is changing, we can slow it marginally, but from a policy perspective, we need to figure out how to deal with the problem because we aren’t going to be able to stop it with environmental regulations. I think the best bet for a real solution are genetically engineered organisms that absorb carbon at a rate several level of magnitude higher than your average tree. I’ve seen some proposals for algae powered street lights that seem a lot more realistic than just reducing emissions from power plants and cars, at least as far as climate change is concerned.

    1. larryg Avatar
      larryg

      “The whole Chesapeake Bay region I believe is seeing more see level rise from subsistence than from a change in volume of the ocean/bay.”

      more so than other east coast areas? I would think we’d see similar sea level changes as other areas , then IN ADDITION the subsistence but why are we focuses only on subsistence ?

      ” I’m not saying sea level isn’t rising from climate change, IE eustatic sea level rise, just that from a policy standpoint, its a flat out lie to say reducing carbon emissions is going to do anything to mitigate sea level rise in Hampton Roads.”

      how so? if sea levels are rising around the world – how is Hampton not affected?

      over time – decades – how could you say without reservation that emissions were not involved? why would you assume that?

      “As for your other question, I definitely think we should be reducing carbon emissions for a number of reasons like air/water quality and to a certain extent climate change. But to use scare tactics and act like anything we are going to do will actually solve the problem is just ridiculous. Our climate is changing, we can slow it marginally, but from a policy perspective, we need to figure out how to deal with the problem because we aren’t going to be able to stop it with environmental regulations. ”

      is that the approach you took with Ozone Holes and regulation?

      “I think the best bet for a real solution are genetically engineered organisms that absorb carbon at a rate several level of magnitude higher than your average tree. I’ve seen some proposals for algae powered street lights that seem a lot more realistic than just reducing emissions from power plants and cars, at least as far as climate change is concerned.”

      oh I agree – but that’s not what you see from most skeptics. They’re are saying that none of it is real – it’s a scam and there is no connection between emissions and climate change.

      you seem to think there is – and that there are things we can do – but you rule out other things.

      how do you know which will work or not? I don’t know either but I tend the trust the same folks who warned us about Ozone Holes and who predict Hurricane paths and effects from Volcano eruptions.. etc.

      I too decry the scare tactics – as well as the folks who say that GW is a global conspiracy … both.

      1. mshapiro Avatar
        mshapiro

        Norfolk was built on filled in marshes and the bay was formed in large part from a giant asteroid impact. So we are in a unique position here compared to the rest of the East Coast.

        As for the rest of the world, global sea level rise numbers are useless and entirely pointless as far as I’m concerned. Our planet is an imperfect ellipsoid, sea level is rising in a lot of places, but also falling in others, so looking at anything from a global basis is a bad idea if you are trying to craft policies. Of what use is it to Norfolk that seas are rising X amount in India when we know they are going to rise Y amount in Hampton Roads due to multiple factors.

        On top of all that, as far as the people who actually have to use sea level in real life to do work, surveyors, sea level is not and has not changed for quite some time. The National Geodetic Survey is just now getting around to re-calculating survey benchmarks with new technology. Really when you get down to it, what we actually deem sea level is almost never where the sea actually is. Its all a probablistic framework based on measurements taken over decades decades added in with gravitational calculations about the effect of the atmosphere on the waters surface. Heck, if we took all the ships out of the world’s oceans, sea level would drop by several feet.

        This problem is 100’s of times more complicated than our politicians make it out to be. So I’m not necessarily dismissing things as working or not working, merely saying that if you are a politician making an argument that we need to do X to prevent climate change, you aren’t giving the whole story because it’s more like we need to do A-Z and invent a few more letters in the alphabet before we get to a real solution. We should be talking about the actual, quantifiable effects of legislation on the environment, not how they are going to prevent climate change.

        1. larryg Avatar
          larryg

          “Norfolk was built on filled in marshes and the bay was formed in large part from a giant asteroid impact. So we are in a unique position here compared to the rest of the East Coast.”

          but why would we not be affected the same way as other coastal areas IN ADDITION to the subsistence?

          “As for the rest of the world, global sea level rise numbers are useless and entirely pointless as far as I’m concerned.”

          other facts are “pointless”?

          “Our planet is an imperfect ellipsoid, sea level is rising in a lot of places, but also falling in others, so looking at anything from a global basis is a bad idea if you are trying to craft policies.”

          especially if you don’t want to know anyhow, right?

          ” Of what use is it to Norfolk that seas are rising X amount in India when we know they are going to rise Y amount in Hampton Roads due to multiple factors.”

          all up and down the East Coast – do you think the East Coast is India?

          “On top of all that, as far as the people who actually have to use sea level in real life to do work, surveyors, sea level is not and has not changed for quite some time. ”

          did you pay attention to how many tunnels in New Jersey got flooded and closed for months and required millions of dollars in repairs?

          what do you think would happen if we had such a storm in Hampton and those tunnels went under?

          “The National Geodetic Survey is just now getting around to re-calculating survey benchmarks with new technology. Really when you get down to it, what we actually deem sea level is almost never where the sea actually is. Its all a probablistic framework based on measurements taken over decades decades added in with gravitational calculations about the effect of the atmosphere on the waters surface. Heck, if we took all the ships out of the world’s oceans, sea level would drop by several feet.”

          have you seen the new FEMA flood maps? do you think that is bogus?

          “This problem is 100′s of times more complicated than our politicians make it out to be. ”

          how about our scientists?

          “So I’m not necessarily dismissing things as working or not working, merely saying that if you are a politician making an argument that we need to do X to prevent climate change, you aren’t giving the whole story because it’s more like we need to do A-Z and invent a few more letters in the alphabet before we get to a real solution. We should be talking about the actual, quantifiable effects of legislation on the environment, not how they are going to prevent climate change.”

          do you believe the scientists? did you believe those same scientists with the Ozone Holes?

          or do you want to believe what you want to believe regardless of science and facts?

    2. LifeOnTheFallLine Avatar
      LifeOnTheFallLine

      “I’m not saying the sea level isn’t rising because of climate change, but what I am saying is that if we figure out a way to stop that from happening it won’t help the water levels in Hampton Roads, which I admit are rising at least in part because of a warmer Earth.”

      Also, I’m not saying that my blood pressure isn’t high because of my current level of sodium intake, but what I’m saying is that even if I did change my diet it won’t prevent me from having a heart attack due to current arterial thickening, which I admit is increasing thanks to hypertension.

      And why is this always an EITHER/OR instead of a BOTH/AND proposition. We can curb cardon dioxide emissions AND put pond scum in our street lights AND roll out wind/solar/geothermal power plants AND get more fuel efficient cars AND pay to protect the carbon sinks that are our rain forests AND etc.

      But you’re probably right, putting out algae lights is going to be way more beneficial to remediating the problem than goingn after the sources.

      1. mshapiro Avatar
        mshapiro

        “Also, I’m not saying that my blood pressure isn’t high because of my current level of sodium intake, but what I’m saying is that even if I did change my diet it won’t prevent me from having a heart attack due to current arterial thickening, which I admit is increasing thanks to hypertension.”

        That’s a pretty accurate analogy, but not perfect. To make it perfect would be to add in a Doctor saying if you cut out sodium you will not die of a heart attack even though you will because your heart muscle is damaged beyond repair.

        Norfolk is built on filled in marshes, the city is sinking 2-4 times faster than seas are rising and will continue to do so regardless of what the climate does.

        1. larryg Avatar
          larryg

          “That’s a pretty accurate analogy, but not perfect. To make it perfect would be to add in a Doctor saying if you cut out sodium you will not die of a heart attack even though you will because you you’re heart muscle is damaged beyond repair.”

          how would you know this to the point where you could guarantee it to be the total truth and thus no need to listen to the doctor at all?

          why would you bet the farm that the doctor was wrong to start with?

          “Norfolk is built on filled in marshes, the city is sinking 2-4 times faster than seas are rising and will continue to do so regardless of what the climate does.”

          doesn’t that mean the subsistence will be IN ADDITION to the sea level rise and that Norfolk is actually is more dire circumstances than say New Jersey was?

          1. mshapiro Avatar
            mshapiro

            You are just nit picking everything so this is my last comment. But I’m not a doctor, I do GIS. I can tell you with 100% certainty that if we cut world wide carbon emissions to zero for the next 100 years, most of Norfolk will still end up under water because of subsidence. That is a fact. 100% certainty. No doubt about it what-so-ever.

          2. larryg Avatar
            larryg

            re: ” most of Norfolk will still end up under water because of subsidence. ”

            the amount of Norfolk under water will depend on what the total sea rise is, combined with subsistence..

            and why would you not want to know what both would do in the first place?

            if 1/3 of Norfolk gets covered by subsistence…

            and 1/2 of Norfolk gets covered by subsistence + sea level rise

            don’t you think using the binary measurement of “under water” totally misrepresents the reality of how much of Norfolk is affected?

            If you were going to to build walls to get the sea out of the tunnels – wouldn’t you seriously want to know how both subsidence and seal level rise would dictate how tall the walls needed to be built?

            or are you saying that once the tunnels go under – it won’t matter anyhow..we’re just going to abandon the whole area?

            these are policy questions you know… you can’t do policy by guessing at things you don’t know – and don’t want to know.

          3. larryg Avatar
            larryg

            see the thing that bothers me is that you seem to be assuming that subsidence trumps sea level rise… in an either/or situation and I keep wondering why the two don’t work additively to increase flooding much more than just subsistence would.

            How do you know that the two are not additive and actually increase overall flooding higher than either one by itself?

            how do you know that?

            who would you believe in doing that analysis to find out?

      2. mshapiro Avatar
        mshapiro

        I’m looking at things from a policy perspective, as I’ve said about a dozen times. From a scientific perspective, your points are valid, from a policy perspective, not so much.

        If sea level is rising in New York by 10mm a year and Norfolk by 4mm a year, Norfolk needs to have different revisions to building codes than New York. So from a policy standpoint for people in Norfolk, which is the main point I’m making, it does not matter how much sea level is rising somewhere else because no one in Norfolk is in charge of New York or anywhere else for that matter.

        Yes, I’ve looked at FEMA flood maps. I do GIS analysis for a living. Do you know what a survey benchmark is? The people who have to actually plot out the points to build anything in this country use these little brass disks set in concrete, most of them over a decade old, that have exact coordinates for lat/long/elevation. Those points have not been updated for a long time and the NGS is just now getting around to doing new calculations. So when a surveyor is triangulating points based on those benchmarks, they are not using the absolute newest calculations for sea level from scientists.

        So yes, I believe in science. But I believe that when you are setting public policy you have to look at the science differently than a scientist would.

        1. larryg Avatar
          larryg

          re: ” I’m looking at things from a policy perspective, as I’ve said about a dozen times. From a scientific perspective, your points are valid, from a policy perspective, not so much.”

          how do you use policy if science is telling you something?

          “If sea level is rising in New York by 10mm a year and Norfolk by 4mm a year, Norfolk needs to have different revisions to building codes than New York. So from a policy standpoint for people in Norfolk, which is the main point I’m making, it does not matter how much sea level is rising somewhere else because no one in Norfolk is in charge of New York or anywhere else for that matter.”

          well it does if you say that looking into the two factors in play and how each affects things – is not to be done.. because you already know from you own beliefs.. then what?

          “Yes, I’ve looked at FEMA flood maps. Do you know what a survey benchmark is? The people who have to actually plot out the points to build anything in this country use these little brass disks set in concrete, most of them over a decade old, that have exact coordinates for lat/long/elevation. Those points have not been updated for a long time and the NGS is just now getting around to doing new calculations. So when a surveyor is triangulating points based on those benchmarks, they are not using the absolute newest calculations for sea level from scientists.”

          I think you are confusing who does the brass disks and what FEMA does.

          FEMA is drawing maps based on satellite measurements of sea level -not geodetic survey markers alone. They can and do easily calibrate…

          but you doubt FEMA’s work? You think they’re doing it wrong?

          “So yes, I believe in science. But I believe that when you are setting public policy you have to look at the science differently than a scientist would”

          so you discount the science and use instead what you believe?

          you pick and choose what science to believe?

          how would you be qualified to decide which science is correct and which is not?

          If science tells you that sea level is going to rise 3 feet – how do you decide they are wrong?

          and why would you choose to NOT determine what the level of damage would be for various different sea level increases – on a range basis – because you knew the prediction was an estimate?

          why not estimate from a low/high range to at least know and understand potential consequences and from that determine a flexible policy?

          you talk as if policy is not decided based on science.. but other things.. like what?

          If you think the scientists are wrong and FEMA is wrong, then who do you believe?

          have you answered the CFC/Ozone question?

          what determined policy in the Ozone example? what led to the policy of phasing out CFCs?

  4. LifeOnTheFallLine Avatar
    LifeOnTheFallLine

    This climate change/global warming thing has been so disheartening to watch unfold in my country. I remember being a grade schooler with a section about greenhouse gases in my science book. It was pretty clear and completely non-controversial. Now it’s political lightning and it’s heart breaking in its absurdity. Just curb emissions already, and if the broad scientific consensus is wrong – like it wasn’t wrong about gasoline and lead; CFCs and the ozone layer; tobacco smoke and lung cancer; or sulfur dioxide and acid rain – we can go back and reexamine.

  5. James A. Bacon Avatar
    James A. Bacon

    Icebergs in Lake Superior Friday. C’mon, Larry, surely you must have the teeniest little twinge of doubt that maybe, just maybe, apocalyptic forecasts based on climate models might be off by just a tad?

    I’d like to know more about Mr. Shapiro’s research. It sounds like a pretty big story if Norfolk is sinking into the sludge. Perhaps he would be willing to submit a column to Bacon’s Rebellion.

    1. LifeOnTheFallLine Avatar
      LifeOnTheFallLine

      Oh, snap! It’s still cold enough to form ice somewhere on planet Earth. Climate data: unskewed!

    2. larryg Avatar
      larryg

      Bacon – why would I doubt that any more than I would what the Ozone scientists said?

      do you think the Ozone guys were any more dead on – with their analysis than the scientists who are telling you about subsistence?

      why do you selectively believe the scientists and believe that some are telling you the truth from on high while others are lying their butts off?

      how do you decide?

      I do not believe apocalyptic forecasts about climate change any more than I believe it when a scientists tells me a hurricane is going to hit dead center somewhere or that an ozone hole could get so large that it gives everyone cancer.

      the don’t say such things in any of those cases.. they talk about a range of outcomes including a worst case.. and we sometimes evacuate entire regions – based on little more than what a group of scientists tell us.

      we all know that these things are warnings about potentials…

      you were warned about Ozone holes – there was no guarantee that any prediction was dead on 100% accurate but you had enough agreement among scientists to at least not discard the whole thing as a bogus scam – as your fellow skeptics freely repeat these days.

      but why do you guys believe some scientists and not others?

    3. larryg Avatar
      larryg

      re: ” teeniest little twinge of doubt that maybe, just maybe, apocalyptic forecasts based on climate models might be off by just a tad?”

      like this (which one was correct? or are they all wrong?):

      Hurricane Sandy Tracks:

      1. larryg Avatar
        larryg

        http://youtu.be/wQOFiAZilLM

  6. DJRippert Avatar
    DJRippert

    Mr. Shapiro is completely correct. The Chesapeake Bay is a very unique body of water that is perhaps the worst possible example to use when trying to prove or disprove rising sea levels from Global Climate Change.

    I will once again cite the example of Sharp’s Island. In 1850 Sharp’s Island was 600 acres. Today the entirety of the island sits under ten feet of water. Perhaps the island would be under 9’11” of water today without global warming. However, it would still be underwater.

    Whether Norfolk will meet the same fate as Sharp’s Island is a question that perhaps Mr. Shapiro would like to discuss. However, things sink in the bay for reasons beyond global warming.

    1. larryg Avatar
      larryg

      I do not doubt the subsistence issue at all.. it’s a fact.

      but how do you or Mr. Shapiro know that there will be no additional, additive increases from sea level rise?

      why do you assume there will be only impacts from subsidence and none from sea level wise?

      how do you arrive at that conclusion?

      1. DJRippert Avatar
        DJRippert

        but how do you or Mr. Shapiro know that there will be no additional, additive increases from sea level rise?

        Mr Shapiro and I both believe there will be additive effects. Those additive effects will add a small additional amount of sea level rise to a much larger amount of subsidence sinkage.

        Both Mr Shapiro and I are making a simple point – using a place where sinking by the foot is fairly common to make a global warming point about the sea rising by inches is illogical. It undermines a legitimate argument. There are plenty of places along the US East Coast where subsidence is not a major factor. They would be better places to argue about rising sea levels caused by global climate change.

        1. larryg Avatar
          larryg

          re: ” Those additive effects will add a small additional amount of sea level rise to a much larger amount of subsidence sinkage.

          Both Mr Shapiro and I are making a simple point – using a place where sinking by the foot is fairly common to make a global warming point about the sea rising by inches is illogical.”

          How do you and Mr. Shapiro know the RATE of subsistence and how do know the RATE of sea level change so that you can compare the two and make your statement believable?

          we have subsidence on every coast of the US and there are multiple studies that look at the combined effect of subsidence and ocean rise – that actually quantify both of them.

          why would either of you presume anything off the top of your head in the first place when there are a plethora of studies available that discuss both of them including their combined effect.

          What this looks like is that you CHOOSE to believe the subsidence scientists and not the sea level increase scientists..

          true?

    2. larryg Avatar
      larryg

      I do not doubt the subsistence issue at all.. it’s a fact but it does come from those nasty lying scientists.

      but how do you or Mr. Shapiro know that there will be no additional, additive increases from sea level rise?

      why do you assume there will be only impacts from subsidence and none from sea level rise?

      how do you arrive at that conclusion that there will be no
      effects from sea level rise – when the rest of the east coast will be effected?

      is there some sort of gate at the entrance to the bay that holds back the sea?

      have you looked at a map showing the subsistence?

      what am I missing here?

      it’s one thing to be a skeptic..but geeze to say the CBay will not be affected by sea level changes seems goofy.

      1. DJRippert Avatar
        DJRippert

        Here is a picture of the Sharp’s Island Lighthouse in 2009. There’s only one thing missing – the island. This isn’t a computer model generated theory. This is just one of many examples of islands which were recently above water now many feet below water.
        http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sharps_Island_Light

    3. larryg Avatar
      larryg

      hey .. how come there are no Chesapeake Bay subsistence “skeptics”?

      How you so sure that the scientists warning about subsistence are not conspiring to scam us so they can get more govt grant money ?

      how come you don’t think they’re not cooking that data also?

      how come you guys believe some scientists and not others?

      you believed the Ozone Hole scientists and their recommended solution
      (I think)

      you believe the scientists that are telling you that we have too much nitrogen and phosphorous in the Chesapeake and their recommended solutions…

      and you believe the scientists telling you that the Bay is subsisting…

      but not the scientists telling you about sea level rise?

      1. DJRippert Avatar
        DJRippert

        hey .. how come there are no Chesapeake Bay subsistence “skeptics”?

        They were all living on Sharp’s Island when it sank. Tragically, none survived.

    4. larryg Avatar
      larryg

      I think if folks do a little searching you will find that subsistence is not at all unique to the Chesapeake Bay region. It’s common from New York to the Outer Banks to Miami to New Orleans, to California in the estuaries, bays and inlets.

      this is pretty simple stuff

      From a scientific paper entitled – “Outer Banks Climate – Utilizing NASA Earth Observations to Establish a Methodology for Assessing Coastal Change in North Carolina “:

      “North Carolina’s dynamic and ever changing coastal region, defined by the Outer Banks and nearby estuarine systems, is especially vulnerable to the effects of climate change.

      — note the following —-

      In addition to the shoreline transformations resultant from erosion and the natural processes of land subsistence, this coastal zone is experiencing increased effects of global climate change.

      Accelerated rates of rising temperatures in recent years have contributed to thermal expansion, melting ice and thus, a rising sea level that is especially stressful for these low lying coastal regions.”

      http://adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/2010AGUFMEP23A0768V

      Here’s another:

      FEMA Paper: ” Projected Impact of Relative Sea Level Rise on the
      National Flood Insurance Program.”

      ” This report contains the findings and conclusions concerning how the National Flood Insurance Program (NFIP) would be impacted by a rise in relative sea level. Based on information recently released by the United Nations on the range in the magnitude of potential rise in sea level, two primary sea level rise scenarios were examined, a 1-foot and 3-foot increase by the year 2100. Under both scenarios, the elevation of the 100-year flood would be expected to increase by the amount of the change in sea level. The area inundated by the 100-year flood is estimated to increase from
      approximately 19,500 square miles to 23,000 square miles for the 1-foot scenario, and to 27,000 square miles for the 3-foot scenario.

      —- again – note the following ——

      The region most significantly affected would be the Louisiana coast,
      where subsidence rates of 3 feet per century would compound the impact of global changes in sea level.”

      so there you have two different scientific analyses for two different places (demonstrating how un-unique the Chesapeake Bay is, and in both papers they talk about the COMBINED impacts of land subsidence AND sea level rise.

      what I’m hearing sounds as if for some people the scientists talking about land subsidence can be trusted , but scientists talking about sea level rise are lying weasels.

      is that it?

      The Harvard and FEMA papers are but two of dozens talking about the combined effects of subsidence and sea level rise.

      FEMA is dramatically increasing premiums and the amusing part is that people are blaming FEMA instead of going out into the free market and getting their own insurance. Why is that?

      this is downright loony…. and it might be funny .. except it actually prevents us politically from dealing with the threats.. we just deny them… and gridlock responses.

      how in the world did we get to this point – where we not only reject what science is telling us – but we see a scientific consensus about it as some kind of conspiracy – for sea level rise – but not subsidence?

      Are NOAA, NASA, and now FEMA engaged in an unholy conspiracy with Climate Scientists to cook data to convince people of a threat that does not really exist?

      so let’s recap.

      we can trust the scientists telling us about subsidence…

      but

      we cannot trust the scientists telling us about sea level change

      but even if true – sea level changes won’t effect areas where there is land subsidence… and that keeps the sea level changes from occurring.

      and FEMA is doing for flood insurance what Obama is doing to coal…

      good lord!

  7. snash Avatar
    snash

    My op-ed wasn’t intended to prove that climate change is real by using sea level rise to make the case. That case has already been made, long since. Yes, climate modeling involves uncertainties, as does all modeling. Those are taken into consideration, rigorously. The overall verdict is the same, alas.

    Both subsidence and global warming are contributing to Virginia’s sea level rise in about equal measure, according to last year’s VIMS report.*

    The important point is elsewhere: that Virginia’s doing nothing about it, nor to meet the other threats that climate disruption will bring to agriculture, public health, natural areas, and our cities.

    *RECURRENT FLOODING STUDY FOR TIDEWATER VIRGINIA, p. 12

    1. larryg Avatar
      larryg

      re: ” The important point is elsewhere: that Virginia’s doing nothing about it, nor to meet the other threats that climate disruption”

      in no small part because we have folks (deniers, skeptics) running around saying that subsidence has been happening all along and increasing seas is a conspiratorial lie – and that, in turn, makes it easy for both Federal and State elected to do nothing and continue to make asinine statements like the earth is 6000 years old and “climate change” is an ongoing natural process not affected by burning fossil fuels.

  8. larryg Avatar
    larryg

    Sea Level Rise in Virginia – for DUMMIES:
    (from page 119 of the referenced study, a common sense
    explanation – for most folks )

    ” Sea level in Virginia is affected by three general factors: the volume of water in the ocean, the elevation of the Virginia shoreline, and the movement of water in the ocean. All three things have been changing in recent times. The result for coastal Virginia has been a long-term and recently accelerating rise in the level of tidal waters in the Commonwealth.

    The first factor – the volume of water in the ocean – is simple to understand. Increasing the volume of water in the ocean will unavoidably raise the water level at the shoreline.

    Two things are currently causing the volume of ocean water to increase. Glaciers, ice caps, and ice sheets in Greenland and Antarctica are melting, adding water that was stored on land surfaces to the ocean basins. At the same time, the water in the oceans is warming causing it to expand.

    Together these processes are believed to have added over half a foot to ocean levels in the past century. Both of these processes have increased recently, and now are adding to the oceans’ volume at about twice the former rate. Depending on how much the earth’s atmosphere warms, these rates are anticipated to increase even further.”

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