Grace Mitchell Tada writes for the Hakai Magazine of Coastal Science and Societies about the damaging effects of rising groundwater due to changing sea levels. From the article
The coastal edges of O‘ahu were historically marshes and agricultural wetlands, situated above underground springs. When Westerners arrived in the late 18th century, they overturned the agricultural practices of the native Hawaiians who had taken advantage of the area’s fluctuating water levels, raising fish along the shore and growing crops like taro in flooded fields bordering the ocean. By the mid-1800s, the Hawaiian government, in part encouraged by American trade interests, started dredging what is now Honolulu Harbor, facilitating easy passage of trans-Pacific deepwater sailing vessels. The dredged sediment was dumped in the tidelands and the nearshore area, forming new land just high enough to not flood. Today, this fill undergirds significant tracts of Honolulu’s urban fabric, and areas built on the dredged fill are especially at risk of rising groundwater.
The article refers to the Hawaiʻi Sea Level Rise Viewer which is an interactive tool funded by NOAA to examine sea level rise impacts.
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday November 19 2020, @07:17AM (1 child)
Just make it illegal, problem solved!!
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2018/sep/12/north-carolina-didnt-like-science-on-sea-levels-so-passed-a-law-against-it [theguardian.com]
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday November 19 2020, @09:39AM
Sea is a valuable resource. It has water, salt, fish, and tidal energy. Tap in or tap out.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by MostCynical on Thursday November 19 2020, @07:55AM
many land developers (often lawyers) became politicians - mayors, state governors, even presidents, partly funded by sale of 'reclaimed' land - mostly swamp, or marsh, or mangrove*, or tidal flat...
Many years later, king tides, basements flood... but outside any warranty period.
*know of examples from four different countries
"I guess once you start doubting, there's no end to it." -Batou, Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex
(Score: 3, Insightful) by bradley13 on Thursday November 19 2020, @08:10AM (17 children)
In the 19th century, they dredged the harbor, and "the dredged sediment was dumped in the tidelands and the nearshore area, forming new land just high enough to not flood." And now, nearly two centuries later, they are complaining that rising sea levels are causing problems? Seriously?
With or without AGW, sea levels have been rising since the end of the "little ice age". Complaining that your dredged land needs maintenance is kind of stupid.
Everyone is somebody else's weirdo.
(Score: 2) by PinkyGigglebrain on Thursday November 19 2020, @08:22AM
And how long have we actually known about the rising sea levels?
"Beware those who would deny you Knowledge, For in their hearts they dream themselves your Master."
(Score: 5, Interesting) by PiMuNu on Thursday November 19 2020, @09:49AM (15 children)
> With or without AGW
Not really:
https://www.sealevels.org/ [sealevels.org]
Kopp, R.E., A.C. Kemp, K. Bittermann, B.P. Horton, J.P. Donnelly, W.R. Gehreis, C.C. Hay, J.X. Mitrovica, E.D. Morrow, and S. Rahmstorf. 2016. Temperature-driven global sea-level variability in the Common Era. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, Vol. 113, pp. E1434-E1441. doi:10.1073/pnas.1517056113.
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday November 19 2020, @11:24AM (1 child)
But but he clearly meant 25,000 years ago only and not the last 3000 years? Surely?
Before you dredge, you look at 25,000 year history not the last measly 2 or 3 thousand years to predict the next century!
/sarcasm for those that have a mental disorder [ucsf.edu]
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday November 19 2020, @11:40AM
"the data, which suggests that it may be possible to spot people with particular neurodegenerative diseases early just by looking for the telltale sign of their inability to detect lies."
i see what you did there ...
(Score: 3, Informative) by bradley13 on Thursday November 19 2020, @02:08PM (12 children)
Let's be honest: that's a stupid graph. The data is correct, but deliberately scaled to induce panic. Look at the same data (last 150 years or so) on a reasonable scale [nasa.gov].
Insofar as AGW has had an effect on sea level, this started in the 1940s or 1950s. Sea level has been rising for a lot longer than that. Hence, my point: The problems that TFA is complaining about have nothing to do with AGW and everything to do with people thinking that artificial land, just barely above sea level two centuries ago, should somehow magically remain above sea level.
Everyone is somebody else's weirdo.
(Score: 4, Informative) by PiMuNu on Thursday November 19 2020, @02:30PM (10 children)
I'm not quite sure what you mean. The graph I linked to showed sea levels more-or-less flat for 1000 years and then climbing rapidly since 1900. Your graph showed that sea levels are climbing rapidly since 1880 with no data before 1880.
> Insofar as AGW has had an effect on sea level, this started in the 1940s or 1950s.
Are you suggesting that the first 50 years of that rapid rise were not AGW, rather "natural cycles", but the last 70 years were AGW? Maybe you are right, but I think it is a hard argument to pull off.
Anyway, I agree that folks who build or buy on flood plains/etc have taken on some risk of flooding. They can't really complain if the risk is realised, or indeed that there is some systematic effect that means the risk increases.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday November 19 2020, @04:37PM (8 children)
Anyone with knowledge of hard sciences can observe that NONE are "AGW".
Because, see, the progression is LINEAR. Which means, the forcing factor is about the SAME today as it was in 1880. NOTHING about human numbers and human tech is the same now as it was then.
And moreover, NOTHING about humans (except data collection) changed so radically about 1880 (or 1860 either) as to cause a switch from rapid fall to rapid rise. Unless you want to attribute the effect to some divine curse or something else of esoteric bent?
(Score: 3, Informative) by Immerman on Thursday November 19 2020, @07:48PM (6 children)
>the progression is LINEAR. Which means, the forcing factor is about the SAME today as it was in 1880. NOTHING about human numbers and human tech is the same now as it was then.
Umm, no. The system loses energy into space at a rate dependent on current temperature, so a constant forcing factor would cause the system to climb to a new equilibrium temperature along an exponential-decay curve - changing quickly at first and then slowing as it approached the new equilibrium.
To maintain constant pace of increase in a system that adapts to the input, you need the forcing factor to constantly increase as well. A simple example anyone can try for themselves is filling a bucket with a hole on the bottom. The rate at which water pours out the bottom depends on the height of water above it - so it will fill rapidly at first, and then slow down as it approaches an equilibrium state where the water is leaving at the same speed it's being added. Increase the speed at which you're adding water, and the water level will climb until the water is again leaving the bucket at the new input speed.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday November 19 2020, @09:25PM (5 children)
in degrees Kelvin taken to fourth power.
I.e. within our survivable range, radiative loss is again very near linear, approximately +1.5% per one degree of warming.
And humans of 19th century had not changed any physical constant to affect these things in so drastic a way. Unless the "Boltzmann first linked entropy and probability in 1877" event really got some overworked alien programmer to botch some line in our simulation. :)
(Score: 2) by Immerman on Thursday November 19 2020, @10:26PM (2 children)
And?
The rate of flow of water out of a bucket is *actually* linear with respect to water height - but you'll still have to constantly increase the speed at which you're filling it if you want it to keep getting fuller at a linear pace.
Basically, in the bucket case you're dealing with a linear-form *differential equation*:
dx/dt = mx + b
Whose solution will be an exponential function in the form of
x = K*e^(mt)
here's an example if you'd like to see the math in action. https://www.mathsisfun.com/calculus/separation-variables.html [mathsisfun.com]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday November 20 2020, @04:15AM (1 child)
Nice try but for two glaring mistakes.
First, when your "mx" is a small number near zero, such as the 0.015*degrees_warming in our case, exp(mx) ~ (1 + mx) and your try to be clever falls flat.
And second, "global warming" in the last couple centuries was anything but linear, whatever graph you choose to believe.
(Score: 2) by Immerman on Saturday November 21 2020, @04:36PM
Why are you obsessing about linearity? No, nothing in the forcing factor or the response is linear.
(Score: 2) by Immerman on Thursday November 19 2020, @10:31PM (1 child)
Also, the industrial revolution began in the early 1800s, and is pretty much defined by our harnessing of fossil fuels to greatly exceed the mechanical work that could be achieved with food-powered people and animals. We've been changing the environmental "constants" for over 200 years.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday November 20 2020, @03:54AM
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Estimates_of_historical_world_population [wikipedia.org]
Show us a linear progression in the 1800-2100 range. And stop babbling about things that are above your ken.
(Score: 2) by PiMuNu on Friday November 20 2020, @09:42AM
> Anyone with knowledge of hard sciences can observe that NONE are "AGW".
You are making a statement that is model-dependent. Discussion about whether this thing or that thing goes with 3rd power or 4th power, whether it is linear or exponential. I think you are being rather naive.
(Score: -1, Flamebait) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday November 19 2020, @07:49PM
Bradley is not nearly so good a climate change denier as frojack used to be. God, I miss frojack!
(Score: 2) by Reziac on Friday November 20 2020, @02:27AM
Not to mention that fill settles more than 'original' land does.
I'm reminded of a similar debacle that started life as a development built over a landfill...
And there is no Alkibiades to come back and save us from ourselves.
(Score: 1, Touché) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday November 19 2020, @04:53PM (1 child)
Not one digit in TFA is about how much the sea level has ACTUALLY risen in real reality. Every single one is "projections" on some sort of scaremongering website.
Namely, tax money gets pocketed by "fighters against climate change" while water pipes are left to rot in the ground long past due replacement. Happens at every altitude around the world, at any distance from coast.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Thursday November 19 2020, @05:32PM
Hence, global climate change. /sarc
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday November 20 2020, @12:21AM
So are we suppose to feel bad that humans paved paradise and put up a sinking stinking parking lot or that they are loosing their homes to what nature is simply reclaiming because of their really stupid choices?
Bet Hawaii looked more beautiful without humans on it.