Wednesday, January 1, 2025

The US States of Sea Level Change - 6

Coastal Cities Face Various Inundation Levels

The last ten years have seen increasing global temperatures each year:

"The WMO State of the Climate 2024 Update once again issues a Red Alert at the sheer pace of climate change in a single generation, turbo-charged by ever-increasing greenhouse gas levels in the atmosphere. 2015-2024 will be the warmest ten years on record; the loss of ice from glaciers, sea-level rise and ocean heating are accelerating; and extreme weather is wreaking havoc on communities and economies across the world."

(Warming temporarily hits 1.5°C, emphasis added). Today's appendix shows a long-range (1800-2050) estimation of sea level change in 15 USA states.

Cracked dry earth stretches toward a colorful sunset sky with pink and orange clouds on the horizon.
Contrast Much?

The actual tide gauge station records (measurements) are sandwiched in between the past and the future projections (Appendix).

What contrasts and conundrums we face.

Yes, the world's largest desert (Antarctica) gets less precipitation than the Sahara desert.

Yet, if its ice sheet was to melt it would cause a ~73.32 m (~240.55 feet) global sea level rise, and if Greenland followed suit it would add another ~6.55 m (~21.49 feet) to the oceans (USGS).

Today's appendix shows that "it" is on the way:

"Human-caused climate change is poised to be the greatest injustice in history. The reach of climate change is global. The scope of climate change, within the lifetime of a young person today, will be monumental and tragic, if governments are allowed to persist on a path of pretense and denial. Climate change is intergenerational injustice, as innocent young people and their children will suffer the most severe consequences. Equally, it is international injustice, as nations that have done the least to cause climate change stand directly in the path of the gathering climate storm.

Climate change must be brought to the International Court of Justice because young people, developing nations, and indigenous people have nowhere else to turn. The nation states have failed the most vulnerable people, leaving them at the mercy of the most powerful members of the global community, who turn deaf ears and blind eyes to the well-being of the public."

(Climate Change at the International Court of Justice, emphasis added, PDF). We can't turn back, we must move forward with a sane compulsion (What Kind of Intelligence Is A Lethal Mutation?).

The previous post in this series is here.



No comments:

Post a Comment