A significant portion of human structures are located close to the coast (seaborne trade having been a huge enabler of economic development for a few hundred years) and are exposed to flooding from rising sea levels, or built in valleys that are increasingly at risk from flooding due to far-above-long-term-historic-norms precipitation runoff (higher atmospheric temps lead to more energy in weather systems; see eg massive floods in Europe in the past few years).
Compared to the other challenges climate change poses those are fairly simple engineering problems. The Netherlands manage fine with large parts of the country below sea level.
I don't know about that. The Iberian peninsula is not historically at much risk for natural disasters, and we now suffer alternating forest fires and floods pretty much every year...
That's not really true. The introduction of so much extra energy into the atmosphere is going to make weather extremes worse all over the world, and harder to predict as historical models become less relevant. Large scale pattern changes like the AMOC shutting down are going to completely change many local weather patterns so that e.g. places that have little history of tornados will start having them, or places that used to be too wet for wildfires will suddenly experience them in extreme drought conditions. Despite scientists' best efforts, we're running a global experiment with no control group and predictions will only become more difficult the harder we push the system into a new state.
> Even pessimistic scenarios don't predict threats to buildings
Floods, storms, droughts, fire? They appear to be getting worse.
More restrictive codes designed for better fireproofing buildings, for instance, can solve a number of problems in California in fire prone areas. Another thing that has a political solution is forest management. Lack of water can be solved by desalination, which becomes an energy problem rather than a water one. Very dry areas can benefit from solar panels because they reduce water loss from evaporation, thus reducing the pressure on water supplies.
Hurricane Sandy flooded big parts of lower Manhattan and Brooklyn. I have friends who couldn't go back to their apartments or offices for months afterwards.
Torrential rain has nothing to do with sea rising which is the topic discussed at hand. You can have torrential rains anywhere in the world not just on the coastline.
Does it really matter if my house burns because of pole drift or because of climate change? I don't like it burning either way. So if there is something I can do against my house burning, (and I know there are things I can do against that) I will definitely try that. And I believe we agree that we could do things, right?
Can there even be geodetic drift of the poles? I sort of assumed that our lat/lon system is based on the poles being fixed points as a matter of definition.
Even pessimistic scenarios don't predict threats to buildings (other than war, which to my knowledge never was insurable) in most areas of the world.
A significant portion of human structures are located close to the coast (seaborne trade having been a huge enabler of economic development for a few hundred years) and are exposed to flooding from rising sea levels, or built in valleys that are increasingly at risk from flooding due to far-above-long-term-historic-norms precipitation runoff (higher atmospheric temps lead to more energy in weather systems; see eg massive floods in Europe in the past few years).
Compared to the other challenges climate change poses those are fairly simple engineering problems. The Netherlands manage fine with large parts of the country below sea level.
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I don't know about that. The Iberian peninsula is not historically at much risk for natural disasters, and we now suffer alternating forest fires and floods pretty much every year...
I remember forest fires yearly in northern Spain in the 80s. Are they more violent now?
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That's not really true. The introduction of so much extra energy into the atmosphere is going to make weather extremes worse all over the world, and harder to predict as historical models become less relevant. Large scale pattern changes like the AMOC shutting down are going to completely change many local weather patterns so that e.g. places that have little history of tornados will start having them, or places that used to be too wet for wildfires will suddenly experience them in extreme drought conditions. Despite scientists' best efforts, we're running a global experiment with no control group and predictions will only become more difficult the harder we push the system into a new state.
> Even pessimistic scenarios don't predict threats to buildings
Floods, storms, droughts, fire? They appear to be getting worse.
More restrictive codes designed for better fireproofing buildings, for instance, can solve a number of problems in California in fire prone areas. Another thing that has a political solution is forest management. Lack of water can be solved by desalination, which becomes an energy problem rather than a water one. Very dry areas can benefit from solar panels because they reduce water loss from evaporation, thus reducing the pressure on water supplies.
It is expensive, but that's another problem.
Seems like having the ocean at your door would be bad for the structure? Or burning down in a hot dry period…
Why would a city like London or Paris burn down in a hot dry period?
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You literally pulled this take out of your ass. Water and fire can shockingly ruin buildings.
Except for Fire?
How did climate change cause vast neighborhoods of single-family wooden mcmansions to be constructed with ~3 meters of separation?
Still waiting for the water to flood New York...
Hurricane Sandy flooded big parts of lower Manhattan and Brooklyn. I have friends who couldn't go back to their apartments or offices for months afterwards.
That happened six years ago: https://www.businessinsider.com/severe-rainfall-hits-new-yor...
And last year: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CxqswOkZMSI
Hurricane Ida in 2019 brought torrential rains which flooded the city, especially the subway.
Torrential rain has nothing to do with sea rising which is the topic discussed at hand. You can have torrential rains anywhere in the world not just on the coastline.
Pole drift.
Does it really matter if my house burns because of pole drift or because of climate change? I don't like it burning either way. So if there is something I can do against my house burning, (and I know there are things I can do against that) I will definitely try that. And I believe we agree that we could do things, right?
Magnetic, rotational, geodetic .. ?
What are you trying to say?
> What are you trying to say?
Perhaps https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cataclysmic_pole_shift_hypothe...
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Can there even be geodetic drift of the poles? I sort of assumed that our lat/lon system is based on the poles being fixed points as a matter of definition.
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