Flooding of U.S. coast, caused by global warming, has already begun –
‘Ultimately, we give up and we leave. That’s how the story ends.’
NORFOLK, Va. — Huge vertical rulers are sprouting beside low spots in the streets here, so people can judge if the tidal floods that increasingly inundate their roads are too deep to drive through.
Five hundred miles down the Atlantic Coast, the only road to Tybee Island, Ga., is disappearing beneath the sea several times a year, cutting the town off from the mainland.
And another 500 miles on, in Fort Lauderdale, Fla., increased tidal flooding is forcing the city to spend millions fixing battered roads and drains — and, at times, to send out giant vacuum trucks to suck saltwater off the streets.
For decades, as the global warming created by human emissions caused land ice to melt and ocean water to expand, scientists warned that the accelerating rise of the sea would eventually imperil the United States’ coastline.
Now, those warnings are no longer theoretical: The inundation of the coast has begun. The sea has crept up to the point that a high tide and a brisk wind are all it takes to send water pouring into streets and homes.
Federal scientists have documented a sharp jump in this nuisance flooding — often called “sunny-day flooding” — along both the East Coast and the Gulf Coast in recent years. The sea is now so near the brim in many places that they believe the problem is likely to worsen quickly. Shifts in the Pacific Ocean mean that the West Coast, partly spared over the past two decades, may be hit hard, too.
These tidal floods are often just a foot or two deep, but they can stop traffic, swamp basements, damage cars, kill lawns and forests, and poison wells with salt. Moreover, the high seas interfere with the drainage of storm water.
Investors controlling $13tn call on G20 leaders to ratify Paris climate agreement
They called for strong carbon pricing to be implemented, as well as regulations that encouraged energy efficiency and renewable energy. Plans for how to phase out fossil fuels also needed to be developed, they said.
Financial regulators needed to force companies to disclose how climate change, and climate-related policies, would impact their bottom line, the group said.
'The Mother of All Risks': Insurance Giants Call on G20 to Stop Bankrolling Fossil Fuels
Multi-national insurance giants Aviva, Aegon, and Amlin, which manage $1.2tn in assets, called on the leaders of the world's biggest economies to commit to ending coal, oil, and gas subsidies within four years.
Tesla Clears Major Roadblock To Mass-Market Success With New Electric Car
The automaker’s 315-mile range sets a new record. New lithium-ion battery pack that can deliver an unprecedented 315-mile range for his electric vehicles (EVs). But SolidEnergy Systems, a new startup spun out of an MIT lab, says it is in the process of commercialising a lithium metal battery that can double the range of all existing EVs.
Central Banks = Welfare for the Wealthy
Central banks can only do one thing, and that's provide monetary welfare for the wealthy.
The fact that central banks provide welfare for the wealthy is now entering the mainstream. The fact that all central bank policies since 2008 have dramatically increased wealth and income inequality is now grudgingly being accepted as reality by mainstream economists and the financial media.
The central banks' PR facade of noble omniscience on behalf of the great unwashed masses has cracked wide open. Even The Wall Street Journal is publishing critiques of Federal Reserve policies that suggest the Fed has no idea how the U.S. economy actually works because their policies have failed to help the bottom 95%.
The grudging admission that central bank policies have enriched the rich while failing to benefit the bottom 95% is a breakthrough--the stone wall of denial has finally been pierced. The mainstream media and the Establishment have resolutely clung to the self-serving fantasy that the Federal Reserve 1) knows what's it's doing and 2) is boosting a "recovery" that will soon achieve self-sustaining "escape velocity"--that is, the economy will generate its own growth and the Fed can dial back its zero-interest rate policy and all its other unprecedented monetary easing measures.
