New York City in Danger of Flooding

According to researchers at the Florida State University (FSU), sea levels in the New York area, as well as in adjacent regions, could rise twice as fast by 2100 than the global means. In other words, while ocean levels in India, Europe and Japan will also increase, they will do so constantly, while on the Eastern coast of the US, it will happen faster, on account of several influencing factors. Warmer ocean surface temperatures, the slowing of the North Atlantic Ocean circulation, and thermal expansion are just some of these “triggers.”

“The northeast coast of the United States is among the most vulnerable regions to future changes in sea level and ocean circulation, especially when considering its population density and the potential socioeconomic consequences of such changes. The most populous states and cities of the United States and centers of economy, politics, culture and education are located along that coast,” Jianjun Yin, who is an FSU Center for Ocean-Atmospheric Prediction Studies (COAPS) climate modeler, warns.

For the new paper, published online on March 15th in the journal Nature Geoscience and titled “Model Projections of Rapid Sea Level Rise on the Northeast Coast of the United States,” Yin has collaborated with University of Illinois in Urbana-Champaign (UIUC) expert Michael Schlesinger and also with Ronald Stouffer, who is a climate scientist at Princeton University's Geophysical Fluid Dynamics Laboratory.

The data for this conclusion have been drawn from not one, but ten state-of-the-art climate models, which have also been used by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) on its Fourth Assessment Report. All the models have shown a single result – while global sea levels will rise by 10 inches (25 cm), the waters of the American Eastern coast will increase theirs by as much as 18 inches (46 cm). That's roughly 8 inches more than in the rest of the world, a difference that is triggered by thermal expansion, and a slower North Atlantic circulation.