We had an article last week on the threat to the Florida real estate market from continued global warming, rising sea levels, increasing flooding and stronger coastal storms. Some comments below the article highlighted that such threats persist on both vast US coastlines and coastlines around the world – not just Florida. The fact is that people have long settled near seas, rivers, oceans, golfs and bays – and many of the world’s most populous and economically vital cities and regions are being physically damaged by the effects to one degree or another Climate change.
One commenter highlighted this threat to a fairly wealthy country he lives in, but noted, “I think we can handle this, but it’s going to be damn expensive.”
I’m not sure how much we thought about it. I think we tend to investigate the possible harm and then our minds tend to tune out before we go any further. Also, we may deeply realize how fragile our economies are and don’t even want to consider the disastrous possibilities.
The thing about physical damage is that it reverberates and is amplified beyond the obvious damage from the first blow. If real estate is flooded or destroyed by a storm, it could affect an individual’s ability to contribute to the economy, take away resources that a city would invest in new infrastructure, and stifle socio-economic or business progress at the scene of the strike made.
When you consider that this could happen to a growing and bustling city – Tampa, for example – that is worrying enough. When you consider that it could happen to major cities and major economic centers of the world essentially at once (one disaster after another over several years and decades), the future doesn’t just look challenging – it looks like a freak from ‘nightmare, ours Economy, society and quality of life will deteriorate indefinitely.
Let’s take a quick look at some of the cities seriously threatened in one way or another by global warming, rising sea levels, more drought and stronger coastal storms: Tokyo, New York, San Francisco, Osaka, Sao Paulo, Mumbai, Miami, Singapore, Surat, Jakarta, Manila, Bangkok, Abu Dhabi, Muscat, Lebanon, Athens, Barcelona, Malaga, Amsterdam, Naples, Venice, Monaco, Marseille, Rio de Janeiro, Tampa, Bahamas (I know, no city), San Diego, Los Angeles, Charleston, Norfolk, Washington DC, Philadelphia, Boston, Casablanca, Cape Town, Perth, Melbourne, Adelaide, Sydney, Brisbane, Malmö, Copenhagen, Rotterdam, The Hague, St. Petersburg, Gothenburg, Helsinki, Stockholm. …
How can anyone more quickly decide if it’s time to electrify traffic (we can do it today! And it’s more fun and would improve our health!), Switch to renewable energy (we can do it today! And it could be us!) Save money and improve our health!), Reduce meat and milk consumption (we can do it today! And it could improve our health!) And buy less useless stuff than falling into socio-economic Armageddon in the coming decades?
If you are 71 or older you may not feel the direct pain of the threat of this invading world. In such a case, you might think that it sounds so terrible that you don’t want to believe it is possible, but it is actually what we ordered. This is indeed what mankind has in store – from Copenhagen to Key Largo, New York City to Monaco, Sydney to Chicago. We are doomed to massive physical, economic and social destruction if we do not change quickly.
None of us represent all of society. We cannot act for the whole of society. We have to act for ourselves. We have to do our own, slightly challenging shifts. We need to inspire others to do the same. The challenge facing human society is that it acts en masse on habits and systems that have evolved over many years. The potential of human society is for us to quickly break down these habits and systems – change them en masse – when we make our own contribution as dominoes in a sophisticated socio-economic domino system.
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