[quote] Sea Level Rise Will Threaten Thousands of California Homes
Chronic flooding will impact areas around San Francisco and Los Angeles by 2035
Sea-level rise threatens thousands of homes in California by 2035, especially in cities near San Francisco and Los Angeles, according to an analysis released today.
Chronic flooding by that year imperils nearly 5,000 homes in the Silicon Valley south of San Francisco, a region that’s home to affluent homeowners and an international airport. In the suburbs north of San Francisco, roughly 4,000 homes are at risk, according to the study from the Union of Concerned Scientists.
A decade later, if sea levels rise faster due to accelerated melting of ice sheets, roughly 13,000 homes valued at about $8.6 billion are in danger in the nine counties surrounding the San Francisco Bay Area.
The findings are part of a national report that analyzed coastal regions around the county. It identified ZIP codes most at risk, tallied the number of homes threatened, and calculated the value of those homes and the amount in property taxes that could be lost.
…The report comes just a few days after a study was published in Nature that showed the West Antarctic ice sheet is melting three times as fast as it did 25 years ago (Climatewire, June 14).
That could wallop California with greater sea rise than the world average. That’s due to a gravitational effect on ocean currents and the way the Earth rotates, according to Helen Fricker, a professor of geophysics at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography at the University of California, San Diego, an author on that study. Three feet of sea-level rise coming from Antarctica would mean it’s 4 feet higher in California.
[quote] Rising bedrock below West Antarctica could delay catastrophic ice sheet collapse
The news last week out of Antarctica was sobering. According to a consensus estimate published in Nature, the continent has lost 3 trillion tons of ice in the past 25 years—most of it from the vulnerable West Antarctic Ice Sheet, where the loss rate tripled over the study period. Although West Antarctica contributed just 6 millimeters of sea level rise in that time, scientists say ice-sheet collapse there could raise global sea levels by 3 meters in the coming centuries. The accelerating loss could be a sign that the catastrophe has already been set in motion.
But a study in this week’s Science offers a glimmer of hope, documenting a process that could slow the collapse. As ice melts and the load on the crust lightens, the bedrock beneath West Antarctica is rising rapidly. In places it could rise 8 meters over the coming century—potentially protecting the ice from the warm seawater that is melting it from below. “It may just buy the world a few extra decades,” says Rick Aster, a seismologist at Colorado State University in Fort Collins and an author of the new study.
basically its not a matter of “if” but “when” TSHTF WRT CA “mean sea level” RE,… or pardon the pun, beachfront RE will be “underwater”
[quote] Climate Change and Housing: Will a Rising Tide Sink All Homes?
…The median value of a home at risk of being underwater is $296,296. The value of the average U.S. home is $187,000.
…left unchecked, it is clear the threats posed by climate change and rising sea levels have the potential to destroy housing values on an enormous scale.
