Florida Sees Signals of a Climate-Driven Housing Crisis (excerpt): NYT

"Home sales in areas most vulnerable to sea-level rise began falling around 2013, researchers found. Now, prices are following a similar downward path."

In Florida, home sales in areas at high risk from sea-level rise

have fallen compared to areas at low risk.

"The idea that climate change will eventually ruin the value of coastal homes is neither new nor particularly controversial. In 2016, the then-chief economist for the federal mortgage giant Freddie Mac warned that rising seas “appear likely to destroy billions of dollars in property and to displace millions of people.” By 2045, more than 300,000 existing coastal homes will be at risk of flooding regularly, the Union of Concerned Scientists concluded in 2018.

The question that has occupied researchers is how soon, and how quickly, people will respond to that risk by demanding price discounts or fleeing the market. Previous research has begun to tackle that question, showing that climate change, far from being a distant threat, is already starting to hurt real estate values."

 

In places like Bal Harbour, Fla., climate worries have reduced demand for high-risk coastal real estate, researchers say.Credit...Rose Marie Cromwell for The New York Times

"Then, starting in 2013, something started to change. While sales in safer areas kept climbing, sales in vulnerable ones began to fall. By 2018, the last year for which Dr. Keys and Mr. Mulder obtained data, sales in vulnerable areas trailed safer areas by 16 percent to 20 percent.

A few things happened around that time that might have made prospective home buyers more worried about climate risk, Dr. Keys said. An international report the previous year highlighted the risks of extreme weather events. After that report came out, Google searches in Florida for “sea level rise” spiked.

And people from the Northeast, who account for a significant portion of Florida home buyers, had just lived through Hurricane Sandy, which damaged some 650,000 homes and caused 8.5 million people to lose power, some for months."

 

Go to NYT original full length story 

 

Related: I’m an American Climate Emigrant (excerpts): Sierra

 

I’m an American Climate Emigrant (excerpts): Sierra

 "My family moved northward for many reasons—climate chaos was among them

By Jason Mark | Oct 12 2020

We were only a few hours’ drive north of the California-Oregon border when I began to feel the pangs of survivor’s guilt. It was mid-August, and the news from back home was no good. We had busted out of the San Francisco Bay Area just as the heat wave began to sizzle California, and as we drove north through wine country, the temperature gauge in our car said it was 108 degrees outside. Days later, a freak electric storm swung across the state, sparking hundreds of fires. Some of our favorite places were burning: the forested mountains around Santa Cruz and the oak woodlands west of Davis, where we had spent many summer afternoons lounging on the banks of Putah Creek. Smoke was already beginning to choke our friends and former neighbors. “You got out just in time,” a buddy texted. “California is imploding.”

The Oregon coast felt, at that time, like a whole new world. As we threaded our way up Highway 1, the sky was cool and gray, and by evening a thick fog had turned into a spitting rain. The smoke and fires might as well have been on another planet. The rain was a relief, but I couldn’t shake a certain shame. I felt bad about our good fortune, about leaving our community behind to suffer.

I had lived in California for more than 20 years, and my family’s long-planned departure was supposed to be an adventure of sorts, an opportunity to start a new life for ourselves in the Pacific Northwest. For months, we had been looking forward to the move with a mix of trepidation and excitement, the swirl of emotions common to any emigrant: nostalgia for the life we had built, spiked with the thrill of surprising horizons. But now, as grim news piled up in our newsfeeds, the move had taken on a sour taste.

We weren’t merely heading toward a new home in another state. With a disaster unfolding behind us, we were fleeing."

Go to the Sierra article 

 

climate change refugees,climate refugees,#California,#USA,climate fires,floods,tidal flooding,

COVID-19 can be an historic turning point in tackling the global climate crisis: UK Committee on Climate Change

(Pics from this blog)  

 If only the current Australian government would take advice like this. This is from the United Kingdom's Committee on Climate Change to the U.K. government in 2020.

Climate Action Now

 "Ministers must seize the opportunity to turn the COVID-19 crisis into a defining moment in the fight against climate change, the Committee on Climate Change (CCC) says today.
 

In its annual report to Parliament, the Committee provides comprehensive new advice to the Government on delivering an economic recovery that accelerates the transition to a cleaner, net-zero emissions economy and strengthens the country’s resilience to the impacts of climate change.

Cities might become unbearable.

Important steps have been taken in the last year, but much remains to be done. For the first time the Committee sets out its recommendations government department by government department. These are the urgent steps that must be taken in the months ahead to initiate a green, resilient COVID-19 recovery. 

They can be delivered through strong coordination across Whitehall. Doing so will propel the UK towards more rapid climate progress and position the country as an international climate leader ahead of the pivotal COP26 climate summit in Glasgow next year.

CCC Chairman, Lord Deben, said: “The UK is facing its biggest economic shock for a generation. Meanwhile, the global crisis of climate change is accelerating. We have a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to address these urgent challenges together; it’s there for the taking. The steps that the UK takes to rebuild from the COVID-19 pandemic can accelerate the transition to a successful and low-carbon economy and improve our climate resilience. 

Choices that lock in emissions or climate risks are unacceptable.”

Climate Change is a fact

Chair of the CCC’s Adaptation Committee, Baroness Brown of Cambridge, said: “COVID-19 has shown that planning for systemic risks is unavoidable. We have warned repeatedly that the UK is poorly prepared for the very serious impacts of climate change, including flooding, overheating and water shortages. Now is the moment to get our house in order, coordinate national planning, and prepare for the inevitable changes ahead. The UK’s domestic ambition can be the basis for strong international climate leadership, but the delivery of effective new policies must accelerate dramatically if we’re to seize this chance.”

The Committee’s new analysis expands on its May 2020 advice to the Prime Minister in which it set out the principles for building a resilient recovery. In its new report, the Committee has assessed a wide set of measures and gathered the latest evidence on the role of climate policies in the economic recovery. Its report highlights five clear investment priorities in the months ahead:

1. Low-carbon retrofits and buildings that are fit for the future.

Hydrogen energy still requires research and development

There are vital new employment and reskilling opportunities across the country if Governments support a national plan to renovate buildings and construct new housing to the highest standards of energy and water efficiency, to begin the shift to low-carbon heating systems, and to protect against overheating. Roll-out of ‘green passports’ for buildings and local area energy plans can begin immediately. 

2. Tree planting, peatland restoration, and green infrastructure. Investing in nature, including in our towns and cities, offers another quick route to opportunities for highly-skilled employment, and outcomes that improve people’s lives. By making substantial changes in our use of land, which are needed to meet the UK’s Net Zero target, we will bring significant benefits for the climate, biodiversity, air quality, and flood prevention.

Land ice is melting

3. Energy networks must be strengthened for the net-zero energy transformation in order to support electrification of transport and heating. Government has the regulatory tools to bring forward private sector investment. New hydrogen and carbon capture and storage (CCS) infrastructure will provide a route to establishing new low-carbon British industries. Fast-tracked electric vehicle charging points will hasten the move towards a full phase out of petrol and diesel cars and vans by 2032 or earlier.

4. Infrastructure to make it easy for people to walk, cycle, and work remotely. Dedicated safe spaces for walking and cycling, more bike parking and support for shared bikes and e-scooters can help the nation get back to work in a more sustainable way. For home working to be truly a widespread option, resilient digital technology (5G and fibre broadband) will be needed.

5. Moving towards a circular economy. Within the next five years, we can not only increase reuse & recycling rates rapidly but stop sending biodegradable wastes to landfill. Local authorities need support to invest strategically in separated waste collections and recycling infrastructure and to create new regional jobs.

There are also opportunities to support the transition and the recovery by investing in the UK’s workforce, and in lower-carbon behaviours and innovation:


1. Reskilling and retraining programmes. The net-zero economy will require a net-zero workforce, able to install smart low-carbon heating systems and to make homes comfortable; to design, manufacture and use low-carbon products and materials; and to put carbon back, rather than taking carbon out, from under the North Sea. Now is the time to build that workforce and to equip UK workers with vital skills for the future.

Our children want answers.

2. Leading a move towards positive behaviours. There is a window for Government to reinforce the ‘climate-positive’ behaviours that have emerged during the lockdown, including increased remote working, cycling and walking. The public sector must lead by example by encouraging remote working. It also needs to innovate in order that customer service can be provided effectively remotely.

3. Targeted science and innovation funding. Kick-starting research and innovation now in low-carbon and adaptation technologies will facilitate the changes needed in the decades ahead and build UK competitive advantage. The COVID-19 crisis has highlighted the importance of research if we are to understand fully the threats and learn how to manage them.

Cities must retreat from the coast.

Achieving the UK’s climate goals and rebuilding the economy fit naturally together. Each makes the other possible. Success demands that we do both. The actions recommended by the CCC will deliver an improved economy, better public health, improved biodiversity and access to nature, cleaner air, more comfortable homes and highly productive and rewarding employment."

Related:   Climate change: How the UK contributes to global deforestation (excerpt): BBC

#economy, #heatwaves, Britain, cities, COVID-19, energy, England, floods, infrastructure damage, reskilling, science, tidal flooding, United Kingdom

Sea level rise from ice sheets track worst-case climate change scenario: Phys.org

Credit: CC0 Public Domain 

Ice sheets in Greenland and Antarctica whose melting rates are rapidly increasing have raised the global sea level by 1.8cm since the 1990s, and are matching the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change's worst-case climate warming scenarios.

According to a new study from the University of Leeds and the Danish Meteorological Institute, if these rates continue, the ice sheets are expected to raise sea levels by a further 17cm and expose an additional 16 million people to annual coastal flooding by the end of the century.

Since the ice sheets were first monitored by satellite in the 1990s, melting from Antarctica has pushed global sea levels up by 7.2mm, while Greenland has contributed 10.6mm. And the latest measurements show that the world's oceans are now rising by 4mm each year.

"Although we anticipated the ice sheets would lose increasing amounts of ice in response to the warming of the oceans and atmosphere, the rate at which they are melting has accelerated faster than we could have imagined," said Dr. Tom Slater, lead author of the study and climate researcher at the Centre for Polar Observation and Modelling at the University of Leeds.

"The melting is overtaking the climate models we use to guide us, and we are in danger of being unprepared for the risks posed by sea level rise."

Sea Level Rise Effect on Mumbai of 1.5m rise

Mumbai, land at risk from 1.5m sea rise

 • We are looking more and more unlikely to prevent global heating.

• Scientists are predicting the melting of the ice covering Greenland with a subsequent sea level rise of 7m.

• This rise does not factor in sea rise from the melting of Antarctica and other ice.

• Already many properties are likely to flood when a high tide is combined with high local rainfall. 

 

What were a hundred year rainfall events are now ten year events.

Mumbai, land at risk with 1.0m sea rise

 

• The frequency of high rainfall events will increase with global heating and more and more severe hurricanes are predicted because of warmer seas.

• Low coastal areas will be subjected to severe storm surges.

• Would you buy a property likely to be inundated in twenty years, fifty years, a hundred years? Many wouldn't. Even the perception of possible inundation will greatly affect property values. Some properties will become more expensive to insure or become impossible to insure

• When certain properties are in less demand their value falls.

• Would you buy a property with a value that is likely to fall?

•  The view of Mumbai above shows areas likely to be inundated by a 1.5m and a 1.0m sea level rise.

• Property above a 10m rise will become highly sought after and will greatly increase in value.

Learn more about how sea rise inundation will affect India's property, indeed any property, at climatecentral.org

An original article by wewantclimateactionnowblogspot.com.au

Related:

Greenland shed ice at unprecedented rate in 2019; Antarctica continues to lose mass: EurekAlert

 

Melbourne: predicted flooding with a conservative sea level rise of only 1.5m

#sea level rise, #Greenland ice melt, #sea ice, #climateaction, #climatechange, #jailclimatecriminals, #cambio-climatico,  

Leaked IPCC report warns of the future of oceans in climate change: Global Landscapes Forum

"This topic will be discussed at the Global Landscapes Forum New York 2019. Learn more about how to join here.

The world’s vast oceans, glacial ice sheets and northern permafrost are poised to unleash disaster, including drought, floods, hunger and destruction, unless dramatic action is taken against human-caused carbon pollution and climate change, warns a leaked draft of a major U.N. report.

The Special Report on the Ocean and Cryosphere in a Changing Climate (SROCC) sounds alarm bells over declines in fish stocks, plus “a hundred-fold or more increase in the damages caused by superstorms, and hundreds of millions of people displaced by rising seas,” according to news agency Agence France-Presse (AFP), which obtained a copy of the 900-page draft report."

Read the complete article 

Related:

Great Barrier Reef outlook now 'very poor', Australian government review says: The Guardian

Fleeing climate change - the real environmental disaster | DW Documentary

DW Documentary

Published on May 2, 2019

How many millions of people will be forced to leave their homes by 2050? This documentary looks at the so-called hotspots of climate change in the Sahel zone, Indonesia and the Russian Tundra. Lake Chad in the Sahel zone has already shrunk by 90 percent since the 1960s due to the increasing heat. About 40 million people will be forced to migrate to places where there is enough rainfall. Migration has always existed as a strategy to adapt to a changing environment. But the number of those forced to migrate solely because of climate change has increased dramatically since the 1990s. It is a double injustice: after becoming rich at the expense of the rest of the world, the industrialized countries are now polluting the atmosphere with their emissions and bringing a second misfortune to the inhabitants of the poorer regions. One of them is Mohammed Ibrahim: as Lake Chad got hotter and drier, he decided to go where the temperatures were less extreme and there was still a little water, trekking with his wife, children and 70 camels from Niger to Chad and then further south. The journey lasted several years and many members of his herd died of thirst. Now he and his family are living in a refugee camp: they only have seven camels left. Mohammed is one of many who have left their homelands in the Sahel - not because of conflict and crises, but because of the high temperatures. He's a real climate refugee.

Study: Sea level rise causes Texas coastal homeowners to lose millions in potential property value: Houston Chronicle

"Sea level rise has cost Texas homeowners $76.4 million in potential property value, with Galveston hit the hardest, a new study released Tuesday found.

First Street Foundation and Columbia University analysts examined about 3 million coastal properties in Texas. Using a combination of real estate transactions and tidal flooding exposure, they found that from 2005 to 2017, homes in Galveston lost $9.1 million in potential value, followed by Jamaica Beach (which lost $8.6. million) and the Bolivar Peninsula ($8.1 million). It’s not necessarily that these coastal homes decreased in value by these amounts, the authors say, but that they didn’t appreciate as much as similar homes not exposed to tidal flooding. Researchers factored in square footage, proximity to amenities and economic trends like the 2008 housing recession."

Read the full article