Grim News for South Florida's Future

The areas shown in orange will be swamped with a 1-meter rise in sea level.

In about a century, some of the places that make America what it is may be slowly erased.

Global warming - through a combination of melting glaciers, disappearing ice sheets and warmer waters expanding - is expected to cause oceans to rise by one meter, or about 39 inches. It will happen regardless of any future actions to curb greenhouse gases, several leading scientists say. And it will reshape the nation. . . .

Few of the more than two dozen climate experts interviewed disagree with the one-meter projection. Some believe it could happen in 50 years, others say 100, and still others say 150. . . .

"We're going to get a meter and there's nothing we can do about it,'' said University of Victoria climatologist Andrew Weaver, a lead author of the February report from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change in Paris. "It's going to happen no matter what - the question is when.'' . . .

Experts say that protecting America's coastlines would run well into the billions and not all spots could be saved. . . .

I have to wonder whether we'd be in this situation had Al Gore become president. At any rate, eight long years of Bush--with the lack of U.S. initiative on climate change--can't have helped.

Check out this animated map from the University of Arizona's Department of Geosciences. More maps here.

Read the whole Guardian article here.