Most coastal communities will encounter 100-year floods annually by the end of the century, even under a moderate scenario where carbon dioxide emissions peak by 2040, a new study finds. And as early as 2050, regions worldwide could experience 100-year floods every nine to fifteen years on average.
Earth's FutureOn the coast, extreme floods can be caused by water pushed inland by storms, tides and waves, but this study focuses on a component that contributes to flooding over a much longer time scale—sea level rise. As higher seas creep up the shore, coastal infrastructure will be closer to the water, making storms, tides and waves more likely to impact communities.
The image above shows the locations of some of the 300 tide gauges for frequency analysis of extreme sea levels used in the new study. Colors indicate how the study predicts return periods for the historical 100-year water levels will shorten by 2050, under moderate carbon emission scenarios. Red dots indicate a return period is expected to shrink to 2 years. Green dots indicate a predicted return of 12 years.
As the climate changes, warmer ocean temperatures and meltwater from glaciers are causing sea levels to rise, increasing the frequency and severity of coastal flooding. As a result, engineers need accurate estimates of future flood risk that don't assume our changing future will reflect historic coastal patterns., manuals of practice and more are all based on the assumption of stationarity," said Moftakhari."They need to be updated to enable us to keep pace with the rate of change.
"We know that mean sea level is rising, the question is: How are we going to deal with it?" said Moftakhari."We've already seen that many portions of the coast are permanently inundated and losing land, and many coastal cities and islands are experiencing flooding much more frequently than in the past—it's time to learn how to deal with non-stationarity."
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