Maine won’t have to wait long before it starts losing valuable coastal infrastructure to high-tide flooding.
Forget king tides and storm surges. A new report from the Union of Concerned Scientists predicts that, under a business-as-usual emissions scenario, sunny-day flooding caused by rising sea levels will affect critical infrastructure as early as 2030.
“Even without storms or heavy rain, high-tide flooding driven by climate change is accelerating along U.S. coasts,” the report concludes. “It is increasingly evident that much of America’s coastal infrastructure was built for a climate that no longer exists.”
Sea levels in Maine are rising faster than ever, with record sea levels measured off the coast of Maine in 2023 and 2024. The Maine Climate Council says Maine will experience a rise of about 1.5 feet in sea level. sea by 2050 and 4 feet by 2100. which means we achieve some global emissions reductions.
The Union of Concerned Scientists report includes three different projections of sea level rise by 2100: 1.6 feet if we greatly reduce emissions, 3.2 feet for a future with reduced emissions (assuming intermediate risks, such as Maine Climate Council) and 6.5 feet if we maintain emissions rates. as they are now.
In a business-as-usual future, the report identifies at least six structures at risk, including a power plant (Brunswick Hydro), a post office (Trevett), two wastewater treatment plants (Noblesboro and Saco) and two industrial sites. contaminated. in Bath, who face the prospect of flooding every two weeks in just six years.
Critical infrastructure is defined in the analysis as facilities that provide functions necessary to support daily life – such as schools, police stations or post offices – or that, if flooded, could impose social risks, such as contaminated industrial sites known as brownfields. .
The number of sites at risk of biweekly high tide flooding under the business as usual emissions scenario increases to 11 by 2050, adding an affordable housing development, a brownfield site, a sewage plant, a post office and Bath Iron . Plays.
By 2100, the number of sites flooded every two weeks due to high emissions will rise to 64 in 31 cities. It includes two city councils (Machias and Long Island), the Bath Police Department, the Lincolnville and Bath fire departments, and the Maine Maritime Academy in Castine.
Some owners and regulators of at-risk sites in Maine are already taking steps to prepare for sea level rise.
“As a shipyard on a major Maine coastal river, Bath Iron Works monitors threats of tidal flooding and sea level rise,” parent company General Dynamics wrote in its 2023 Sustainability Report. “Bath Iron Works incorporated the anticipated flood levels in their future facility plans.
In the case of BIW, not only is it a major regional employer and contributor to the tax base, but it is also one of Maine’s at-risk infrastructure sites releasing toxic chemicals and pollution, according to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. Joined.
On a much smaller scale, Portland businesses in a Marginal Way building facing tidal flooding every two weeks by 2100 believe they will be protected by the massive storage tanks the city built beneath the playing fields at nearby Back Cove Park. Nuisance flooding that reached knee-deep has forced them to close in the past.
The report urges the state and its coastal communities to adapt and build resilience before it is too late.
Maine doesn’t have as many coastal infrastructure assets at risk as other U.S. states because it’s not as developed, said report author Erika Spanger, director of strategic climate analysis at the Union of Concerned Scientists’ Climate and Energy Program.
But a review of the list reveals that Maine will face coastal infrastructure risks sooner than many of the other states, giving it less time to begin the lengthy (and often expensive) process of planning, implementing and funding its resilience efforts, Spanger said.
As tidal flooding risks to Maine’s aging infrastructure increase in the coming decades, Spanger called on policymakers and the public to take urgent steps to prepare communities and dramatically reduce the use of fossil fuels, which It is the main cause of the climate crisis.
A warmer climate caused by the production of heat-trapping gases from the use of fossil fuels causes sea water to expand and ice on land to melt, causing sea levels to rise.
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