Let’s Build Those Levees

By all means, we should be working to  prevent climate change.  But it’s getting warmer no matter what we do (but we can affect how much warmer) so we should also prepare for a warmer world.

A new study in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences on Monday projects sea levels could rise from 9 to 48 inches by 2100. The wide range of uncertainty is due to the Antarctic and Greenland ice sheets, which appear fairly stable but if they were to start melting, could contribute as much as 25 inches to sea level rise.

The study projects that even with conservative economic and population growth, $17 trillion in coastal assets could be sitting below the 100-year flood level by 2100. In a wealthier, more populous world, that number would balloon to $210 trillion. . .

Levees offer a simple defense against flooding. The new research estimates that it would cost $12-71 billion a year to build levees high enough to keep pace with rising seas.

Though flooding would still cause damages just as it does today, Hinkel said it would be a fraction of the cost.

We pay now or we pay later.

By: Stuart Shapiro

Stuart is a professor and the Director of the Public Policy
program at the Bloustein School of Planning and Public Policy at Rutgers
University. He teaches economics and cost-benefit analysis and studies
regulation in the United States at both the federal and state levels.
Prior to coming to Rutgers, Stuart worked for five years at the Office
of Management and Budget in Washington under Presidents Clinton and
George W. Bush.