Seas have drastically risen along southern U.S. coast in past decade – the Washington Post
Multiple new studies highlight a rate of sea level rise that is ‘unprecedented in at least 120 years’ along the Gulf of Mexico and southeastern U.S. coast.
Scientists have documented an abnormal and dramatic surge in sea levels along the U.S. gulf and southeastern coastlines since about 2010, raising new questions about whether New Orleans, Miami, Houston and other coastal communities might be even more at risk from rising seas than once predicted…
Hemsby: How many other communities are at risk of erosion? – BBC News
Coastal erosion claimed three homes in Hemsby last weekend and a further two properties in the village are deemed at serious risk. Are there other Hemsbys along the coast and what can be done to protect the communities which live there?
The East Anglian coastline is no stranger to coastal erosion…
Cruise Ship Invasion Interactive Feature – Hakai
Elizabeth Burton, a Seattle-based activist with the organization Seattle Cruise Control, calculated that the total climate impact of a typical Alaska cruising season, beginning and ending in Seattle (including flights), is equivalent to one-third of the city’s entire annual carbon emissions…After a one-year pandemic pause and a limited season in 2021, cruises to Alaska resumed and surged in popularity in 2022…an estimated 700,000 passengers will depart Seattle, Washington, on hundreds of different cruises. These travelers voyage on increasingly massive ships—some about three sport fields in length—that can house, feed, and process the waste of upward of 4,000 human beings…
China’s Mekong dams turn Thai fishing villages into ‘ghost towns’- Context
From February to April each year, Kam Thon spends most of her days knee-deep in the waters of the Mekong River by her village in northern Thailand, gathering river weed to sell and cook at home. Kam Thon and other women who live by the Mekong have been collecting river weed, or khai, for decades, but their harvest has fallen since China built nearly a dozen dams upstream. The dams have altered the flow of water and block much of the sediment that is vital for khai and rice cultivation, researchers say…
Microplastics Are Filling the Skies. Will They Affect the Climate? – Yale Environment 360
Recent studies reveal that tiny pieces of plastic are constantly lofted into the atmosphere. These particles can travel thousands of miles and affect the formation of clouds, which means they have the potential to impact temperature, rainfall, and even climate change.
Plastic has become an obvious pollutant over recent decades, choking turtles and seabirds, clogging up our landfills and waterways. But in just the past few years, a less-obvious problem has emerged…
Coastal crisis: It’s a race against time, and tide, for those living in Odisha’s coastal villages; here’s why – Down To Earth
Odisha is fast losing its shoreline to rising sea levels. Its adaptation plans must not only be immediate but also foolproof…
It is a race against time, and tide, for those living in Odisha’s coastal villages. Data with the National Centre for Sustainable Coastal Management, Chennai, shows that 74 villages in the state are severely affected by shoreline erosion—the highest in the country…
Massive beach restoration project for Orange County coastline approved – CBS | KCAL News
The Federal Government has agreed to a major beach restoration project in Orange County to restore almost 2 million cubic feet of sand lost to storm erosion over the past several years.
The sand will be dredged from the sea and added to replenish the coastline from Seal Beach to Bolsa Chica to Huntington Beach and as far as the Newport Beach Pier.
“We’re experiencing a large amount of receding of sand into the ocean,” said Kevin Pearsall, State Parks Superintendent.
The project will help protect property and roads from flooding. Seal Beach saw flooding in January.
“It’s nerve wracking that they have to do that, but time erodes everything,” said Colleen Walsh, a Bolsa Chica resident…
10 years later, see how Superstorm Sandy changed the Northeast – National Geographic
“When Sandy hit, New York City had zero coastal protections,” says Daniel Zarrilli, special advisor for climate and sustainability at Columbia University…”I credit Sandy as that pivotal moment that not only launched billions of dollars of resilience investments across the city…It also provided the spark for a whole range of other climate policies…”
There are 21,000 pieces of plastic in the ocean for each person on Earth – the Washington Post
And plastic pollution has been doubling every six years.
Humans have filled the world’s oceans with more than 170 trillion pieces of plastic, dramatically more than previously estimated, according to a major study released Wednesday.
The trillions of plastic particles — a “plastic smog,” in the words of the researchers — weigh roughly 2.4 million metric tons and are doubling about every six years…