A Low Carbon Life | Post 3 2017 | Rising Sea Levels & Land Sales

Repetitively we are told that rising atmospheric temperatures will lead to rising sea levels and people living in coastal areas will be at risk of inundation, from both the rising sea levels and the increasing frequency and ferocity of ocean storms.  As someone who lives in an elevated inland area, these warnings are rather remote but the other day I was trawling through advertisements for cheap land sales, for reasons that aren’t worth explaining, and I came across something I have never seen before.  If you look closely at the advertisement, you will see that it says, ‘Although located in a residential area surrounded by housing, this allotment has been zoned Special Use Schedule 3 to prohibit further housing development due to the possibility of rising sea levels. Ideal for a weekender or holiday block.’ Wow!  This is the first time I have really ‘got it’ that some coastal towns near where I live, not in some distant overseas country, are actually stopping development because of climate change.  They are also implying that existing housing will be threatened by sea levels.

Having said I have only just ‘got it’, I did get a hint of how serious the issue is about 12 months ago when I visited a beach near Adelaide.  What I saw is the image at the start of this post as well as the one to the left.  What particularly surprised me was that the work on the board walk, which was recent, had presumably been undertaken assuming everything would be as it has always been, but it had actually washed away or been seriously damaged.

Until next time, Jane