Accept downtown deluge, thanks to global warming
Scientists: Sea levels will wreak havoc
The historic storm surge that flooded city streets with frigid seawater during Thursday’s blizzard could become a more regular event, according to some local scientists.
“The storm had more water to work with, we know that that’s connected to climate change,” said Erika Spanger-Siegfried, from the Union of Concerned Scientists. “We know that sea levels have risen, that’s a known connection.”
Spanger-Siegfried and other scientists said they worry that rising tides could mean more flooded downtown streets in the immediate future and wreak even more havoc down the line.
Juliette Rooney-Varga, associate professor of biological science at the University of Massachusetts Lowell, predicts that by year 2100, sea levels could rise 12 additional feet.
“That means that next year’s storms, or the storms of the next five years will potentially be worse than the storms today,” she said.
Rooney-Varga said the city has made a strong effort to prepare for what’s coming through mapping analysis and engaging experts.
“Yet at the same time, we’ve continued to develop waterfront property,” she said. “You wonder which city made the effort to do that planning, and then is it a different city that continues to build on that waterfront as if that effort hasn’t been made?”
The National Weather Service made it official yesterday, saying Thursday’s storm inched past the Blizzard of ’78 with a 15.16-foot tide.
The Boston Planning & Development Agency said in a statement that “newly approved projects along the South Boston Waterfront, including the Seaport Square development and the General Electric Headquarters, will be constructed with their ground floors almost 3 feet above the 500year flood elevation.”
Yet, not everyone in the scientific community agrees with Mayor Martin J. Walsh’s global warming worries. Former MIT professor of Meteorology Richard Lindzen called the concerns over rising sea levels “gibberish.”
Lindzen said sea levels haven been rising about 7 inches a century, for many centuries.
He added: “There’s been no change from that. It’s not enough to have made much difference.”