Tags
Chronic coastal flooding, Coastal real estate market, Global warming, High-risk coastal cities, Sea level rise, Underwater: Rising Seas Chronic Floods and the Implications for US Coastal Real Estate June 2018
Price Reduced Waterfront Property – East Coast USA
Photo Credit: Union of Concerned Scientists (UCS) June 2018 Report
On September 14th, Hurricane Florence hit the North Carolina coast. With warmer oceans driven by climate change, the massive, slow-moving storm dumped more than 20 inches of rain on its arrival. The storm surge reached levels of 9 to 13 feet. Hundreds of inundated home owners may never recover from the damages.
Ten years ago, on September 15, 2008, another kind of disaster struck our nation with the collapse of Lehman Brothers and the insurance giant AIG. The worst financial crisis since the Great Depression sent rogue waves across our nation and worldwide. The fallout—foreclosures, shrinking home values, and millions of job losses—battered Americans.
With rising sea levels—the result of ongoing heating of our oceans and atmosphere—another massive, slow-moving crisis is brewing. Hundreds of thousands of coastal properties will increasingly face chronic high-tide flooding. Their falling property values will threaten local and regional real estate markets that could cascade nationwide into a coastal real estate bust.
“Most homeowners, communities, and investors are not aware of the financial losses they could soon face,” says Rachel Cleetus, Lead Economist and Climate Policy Manager at the Union of Concerned Scientists (UCS) and co-author of the UCS report Underwater: Rising Seas, Chronic Floods, and the Implications for US Coastal Real Estate, published in June 2018.
Using data provided by Zillow, the online real estate company, the report estimates that more than 300,000 of today’s residential and commercial properties in the contiguous United States will be at risk of chronic, disruptive flooding—defined as occurring 26 times or more per year—within the next 30 years.
Within the next 15 years, based on a global sea level rise of 6.6 feet by 2100, about 147,000 existing homes and 7,000 commercial properties—currently valued at $63 billion—are at risk of chronic, disruptive flooding. By 2045—near the end of the lifetime of a 30-year home mortgage issued today—the study predicts that sea levels would affect almost 311,000 of today’s homes. That’s half a million people.
By 2100, the number of today’s residential and commercial properties at risk of chronic flooding would rise to 2.4 million and 107,000, respectively. A whopping 4.7 million people. Lower-value residential properties, across hundreds of blue-collar towns, make up 60 percent.
Chronic flooding impacts property values, eventually becoming worthless on the real estate market. Waves of coastal foreclosures and abandoned homes could result in falling property values even for homes outside the blighted zone. This would shrink local tax revenue. Flooded streets and commercial areas would further erode municipal budgets.
Flooded street during high tide – Miami Beach, Florida – September 2015
Photo Credit: Washington Post (NOAA)
“Property values in most coastal real estate markets do not currently reflect the risk of flooding from sea level rise,” Cleetus says.
In most cases, mortgage providers, real estate agents, and insurers have no obligation to disclose the risks of chronic flooding from sea level rise. Added to this, federal, state, and local policies have created incentives that favor developers, exposing more people and property to risk.
In high-risk communities, homeowners and business investors need resources and information to understand the risk and figure out their options. Updating federal flood risk maps to reflect sea level rise would be a good start.
To read the full report, go to the UCS website.
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Pingback: Why should I care about rising sea levels? | Three Worlds One Vision – A record of mankind's degradation of planet earth
Thanks for the reblog 🙂
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These statistics are a grim read, aren’t they.
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They sure are, Geoff.
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Reblogged this on Guyanese Online.
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Thanks for sharing, Cyril. Have a great week 🙂
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Pingback: Why should I care about rising sea levels? – By Rosaliene Bacchus
It’s a global thing!
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That’s very true, Pauline. The report just focused on the USA. From what I’ve read, rising sea levels could swamp some of New Zealand cities and displace millions of people.
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Yes, that is so. There are also many Pacific Islands where the land will disappear and the people will be homeless. It’s all pretty much ignored…….
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And these are people who are not responsible for the carbon dioxide build-up.
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The coast of Guyana is under sea level. Georgetown suffers annual flooding which will get worse as sea level rises caused by global warming.
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Indeed, Leslie. The Guyanese people living along the coastline of Guyana should be very concerned.
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While the rising of the waters may not affect us at that precise moment, the rising waters and change in climate will affect everyone at some point in time.. no matter where one lives, one should be concerned… one can run but one cannot hide… 🙂
“Change is the law of life. And those who look only to the past or present are certain to miss the future.” John F. Kennedy
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Dutch, that we would all be affected by the sea level rise, regardless of where we live, became clear to me on reading the report. Here’s what one of the real estate market experts had to say, as quoted in the report:
“As risks increase, insurers will pull out of markets and limit coverages, increase deductibles, or raise rates. When significant volumes of property value decline and mortgage delinquencies increase, there are major ramifications for our entire financial system, as we experienced in the 2008 financial collapse caused by the mortgage-market meltdown.”
— Cynthia L. McHale, director, Ceres
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And it is not just the economics either… it will affect health, social order, etc… like the domino effect… 🙂
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So true, Dutch. We forget the domino effect.
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I think people will “react” only when their individual backs are firmly against the wall and there’s no climbing over. The average Earthian’s brains aren’t wired with the sense to plan for any projected future events. By and large Earthians are reactionary creatures. To act now in order to forestall any future climate change cataclysm would mean changing the global consumerist lifestyle. The immediate consequences to economies and job “markets” would be catastrophic in the short term. Besides that, predatory capitalism that drives the elitist machine would be destroyed or severely curtailed and the billionaire beneficiaries of the current system aren’t going to allow meaningful change to occur through their own machinery of exploitation. If their bought and paid for governments turn on them they have the militaries and para-military organizations to force their will upon the planet. Besides which we still don’t know if climate change is man-made, a natural occurrence or a combination of both. If we assume it is man-made and proceed with massive change that ultimately changes nothing, it’s a guarantee that all over the planet heads will roll. The seriousness of getting this right the first time cannot be overemphasized. That is why little or no action is being taken – no one wants to risk it… unless any proposed change guarantees more profits. But as George Monbiot points out (https://www.monbiot.com/2018/09/12/plastic-soup/) changing what we consume isn’t the answer. The entire consumer society has to go: who’s going to bell the cat? That’s my question.
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Quite a dilemma for our species, Sha’Tara, as you so clearly describe!
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That is a very conservative estimate. There are clear indications now that sea level rise will be much higher by the end of this century.
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Robert, UCS used the high scenario level developed for the 2014 National Climate Assessment and localized for their analysis. The high scenario assumes rapid ice sheet loss and projects a global average sea level rise of 6.6 feet (2.0 m) above 1992 levels by the end of this century. According to the authors: “The high scenario is considered most applicable in situations with a low tolerance for risk. This makes it most suitable for estimating the scale of risk to residential properties, which typically represent a homeowner’s greatest single asset.”
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Ever since sea level rise projections began to be taken seriously, the numbers keep getting revised upward almost on a yearly basis. This is due to the natural conservatism of science regarding climate forecasting as well as to the increasing knowledge of climatology especially regarding climate feedback loops which impact glacial and ice melt.
The high scenarios published in 2014 were eclipsed with publications in 2016-2017 to a plausible 8-10 ft. of sea level rise (see: https://tidesandcurrents.noaa.gov/publications/techrpt83_Global_and_Regional_SLR_Scenarios_for_the_US_final.pdf). Also, German researchers in 2016 asserted that thermal expansion of the oceans was likely to be twice what had been projected to date. Furthermore, the Fourth National Climate Assessment (NCA4) is due to be published later this year, so another revision is possible.
I’m not disputing the 2014 figures, just pointing out that we have a long way to go in fully understanding the dynamics of climate change, and that the more we learn the worse the projections seem to get.
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Thanks for the update, Robert. The UCS study should therefore be considered as the low scenario. It just gets worse with time. But, as Sha’Tara observes, people have a tendency to “react” only when it’s too late to take evasive action. My son made a similar comment.
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Enlightening, Rosaliene. The circumstances described suggest a couple of additional things to me: 1) Those internationally whose lands become less inhabitable or uninhabitable will need to move, creating an even greater crisis of migration than currently exists and 2) For those of us in the US, population will move in the direction of the center and north-center; additionally, if the US remains a superpower, we and other such countries might encounter internal political pressure to take over other weaker countries. All this is my speculation, of course.
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Dr. Stein, thanks for sharing your speculative vision of our future global crisis. Speculation (1) is already underway and will get worse over time, as you have mentioned. Speculation (2) is also occurring with the destruction of homes following “frankenstorms” during the hurricane season. As to Speculation (3), all things are possible. Small island nations will cease to exist.
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I see a certain amount of poetic justice in the fact that most of this exclusive waterfront property is owned by the extremely wealthy, many of whom owe their wealth to ownership of fossil fuel stocks.
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I think that’s a really good point…
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True, Dr. Bramhall, but the extremely wealthy are, no doubt, well-covered by flood insurance.
According to the UCS report, 60 percent of the homes at risk are lower-value properties, located in hundreds of blue-collar towns dotting the US coastline in 8 states: Massachusetts, Delaware, Pennsylvania, Maryand, Virginia, Mississippi, Oregon, and Washington.
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Second good point to the first good point. That’s how we determine that passing the buck or responsibiliy doesn’t work for anyone. The rich will squeeze more money to pay added environmental costs to themselves from either more exploitation of nature, more government tax breaks or less wages to employees, the usual methods will be used. The poorer ones who lose their homes due to rising waters will, if observation serves at all, continue to vote for the likes of Trump who has the instant solutions in biggly tweets. For those who see the real story the question becomes one of responsibility beyond writing about it. What exactly should be done in the immediate future to prevent a catastrophe that the news will not publish and that will lead to rising “crime” as people, esp the younger generation, seeks to survive and find the “American dream” for itself? Lowering carbon emission may be a very long term slowing down of the inevitable drowning of coastal areas and low-level islands, but what about today? Here in the Lower Mainland the various governments have been on a steady construction, maintenance and lifting or relocating of dykes to prevent major and catastrophic flooding in the long term. I live just a few yards behind an old 1920’s dyke that is now being rebuilt and raised by some 3 feet (one yard) and extended into native reservations that had not been dyked, to prevent back flow of rising waters. At least there’s forethought and action. No wonder Trump vowed to “annihilate” Canada.
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So unfortunate.<3
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Thanks for dropping by, Laleh 🙂
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My pleasure.<3
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This is shocking! If we continue mass producing and consuming at the rate we do, things are inevitably going to get worse. To achieve change, the whole economic system needs restructuring. It’s caused too much devastation.
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I totally agree with you, Ash. Things are going to get worse. Change we must.
Thanks for dropping by 🙂
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Change we must: direct and to the point, Rosaliene. I was reading a recent George Monbiot article in which he argues that we cannot accomplish this change just by individuals wanting to do so. While I would like to hotly disagree with him, I realize he is at least part right – there is a System of destruction out there of which we are a part, individually and collectively. I can sacrifice as much as I want (I do some, as does my upstairs renter) being careful and aware of our footprint, but that is just two. OK, so if as individuals we cannot do it, what kind of collective can be imagined, invented and set up to counter the corporate/consumer steamroller elephant in the room so few seem to notice? I don’t have an answer to that. Some believe that alternative energy sources will pull our chestnuts out of the fire, but if these “alternative systems” are as greed-driven as those they claim to replace, where will be the gain for the poorest who always end up paying the heaviest price, no matter what method is used? We could perhaps elect governments willing to institute Draconian measures to lower the carbon footprint and plastic use, but who will be the ones who will bear the brunt of these measures? Certainly never the rich.
Let me wander down history lane, World War II, and those famous female Russian snipers who killed so many Nazis. Snipers work alone, remember. Lyudmila Mikhailovna Pavlichenko was an individual credited with 309 confirmed “kills” of Nazis. No one came near her record and she got the nickname, Lady Death. Her bullets could come from anywhere, and they found their targets unerringly. Each time she did this, she risked her own life, knowingly, for the other side had snipers also.
Here was one individual who gave all she had to a cause, and how many of her own people’s lives did she save? How did the fear of these snipers (there were thousands of female snipers on the Eastern Front) affect the enemy’s effectiveness? We can’t know, but we can assume that their presence had a powerful impact on the enemy’s advance and subsequent retreat.
Perhaps George Monbiot is right, but that does not negate the fact that in the end, if change is to come, it will be the concentrated efforts of individuals who will bring it about. Collectives will get the limelight but it will be individuals who will be the unsung heroes. Those who recycle; those who walk or bike despite the real risks of being hit in traffic. Those who consciously choose certain products over others because they bothered learning about the source of those products. Those who choose to change how they eat – a huge one, and how they entertain themselves.
No matter what we do to try to “save the planet” it will always come down to committed individuals. Without these there is no hope.
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important issue of survival, Rosaliene!
i grew up on the CA coast
and can vision communities
being underwater, literally.
thank you for helping us all care,
even if we do live in-land 🙂
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If only “the nation” (there must be one, even if to date it remains nameless) would take itself seriously enough to do something about it’s fixable problems! Donald wants to build a wall along Mexico, so the idea of a very long, biggly wall is already in the mind of “the nation” (he did get elected president) so why not change that to something useful, like dykes? Call in a few Dutch engineers to explain what the concept of a dyke is, then a few more to actually test the idea in Florida, California or wherever the waters seem to be intent on rising. It strikes me as hilarious that Holland isn’t screaming “Foul!” at rising sea levels when so much of their lands were below sea level long before anyone thought of invoking climate change; obviously they’re coping. Or are sea levels only rising against USA shores and properties? God’s special punishment for white supremacy and Christian fundamentalism?
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According to the UCS Report, a sea defense system would not work for all states because of the sheer cost of such a project.
“Impervious seawalls would need to extend along large stretches of shoreline. Such defensive measures require investment – both initially and for ongoing maintenance and operation – on a scale that many communities will be unable to muster with diminished tax bases.”
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Unless people have completely abdicated their responsibilities to predatory elites, it is NEVER an issue of cost, but of common sense at predicting events and preempting catastrophe, both which the USA have done little or nothing about. First and foremost, over 50% of government “income” goes into a useless, devastating military – that must stop completely as there is no logic to it, just unconscionable profits soaked in blood, refugee crises and famine. Trillions of $ could be focused upon shoreline defense against rising seas. Engineers and government gumption would determine which parts of the shorelines should be protected by dikes, and which of the more convoluted should be allowed to go under, even if that meant a Trump golf course or two would disappear (Oh, what a shame!) Here in the Lower Mainland, the dikes do not encompass all land that is showing – that would be impossible, but only the “main” parts, thus allowing space for the waters to spread but not destroy everything as they are stopped by “common sense” diking systems that incorporate massive pump stations at critical junctions of drainage channels into the main rivers and shores. It’s not the money that is lacking, it’s the will power to retake control of government, getting rid of the gun/military/corporate whores in no uncertain terms. For that the USA would first of all need to rid itself of all vestiges of both the Republican and Democratic “parties” and institute a new kind of government, like a People’s dictatorship. Crisis must be met with new thinking and new ways. Or… the worst will continue to manifest until little is left. Make no mistake, neither Repugnicans nor Dem-0-c-Rats care a whit about the “nation” – only about their own money hoarding and notoriety. Under the present system all “elections” can only be construed as a sick farce, or carrot on a stick.
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Thanks for dropping by, David. While our inland brothers and sisters face no risk from chronic high-tide flooding, they could be indirectly impacted by a crisis in the coastal real estate market.
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true dat, Rosaliene!
here’s wishing that
all treat each other
like brothers & sisters
when mass migrations ensue,
leaving their guns behind 🙂
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This is surely something we all need to be more aware of. The rivers here in North Carolina are still cresting, keeping many people from returning home even though they do not live on the beach.
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JoAnna, thanks for reminding us that we should not be complacent if we live far from the beach. Higher sea levels also mean higher levels in rivers that empty into the oceans.
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Excellent and informative Rosaliene. Thank you for putting this together and sharing
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Thanks, Denzil. From what I read, European countries are way ahead of the USA on dealing with this issue. As Sha’Tara notes in her comments, we could learn a lot from the Dutch engineers.
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I’ve reposted this article on Facebook where I post publicly. It needs a large audience, the larger the better. It is a topic that has worried me for years. If we had elected (we did but the election was stolen) Al Gore in 2000, the situation might be different.
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Thanks for spreading the word, Barbara 🙂
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What’s notable (and unforgivably) is that the Republican-controlled legislature in North Carolina passed a law in 2012 stating that climate science must be ignored when setting development guidelines for the State’s coastal areas. Insanity bites, as they say!
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Henry, the state’s economy would suffer if real estate and other investors knew the risks. Florida faces the same situation. Dr. Harold Wanless, professor and chair of the Department of Geological Science of the University of Miami, thinks that “the [state] government should require the mortgage and insurance companies to let people know at what point they will no longer give thirty-year mortgages.” (Quoted from The End of Ice by Dahr Jamail)
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