Good news: Washington D.C. may be doomed to inundation

By | February 7, 2009, 2:26am PST

Summary: New projections of the effects of melting Anarctic ice caps: sea waves above Washington D.C. The researchers project sea level variation will not be uniform around the globe. It will be much higher in North America and the Indian Ocean. And, they say, if the entire West Antarctic ice sheet disappears it [...]

New projections of the effects of melting Anarctic ice caps: sea waves above Washington D.C. The researchers project sea level variation will not be uniform around the globe. It will be much higher in North America and the Indian Ocean. And, they say, if the entire West Antarctic ice sheet disappears it could raise sea level more than fifteen feet in some areas. That melting ice sheet is largely above today’s current sea levels.
I recently blogged about the effects of rising ocean levels in Bangladesh, probably the most endangered mainland country along the Indian Ocean. I predict a boom in levee building the world over. Imagine how much the U.S. Corps of Engineers could spend trying to save Washington. At least as much as we’ve spent “saving” Citicorp I suspect.

Kick off your day with ZDNet's daily e-mail newsletter. It's the freshest tech news and opinion, served hot. Get it.

Topics

Disclosure

Harry Fuller

http://blogs.zdnet.com/green/?page_id=2

Biography

Harry Fuller

Harry Fuller is a media veteran, having spent decades in TV news in the San Francisco Bay Area. As GeneralManager of KPIX-TV (CBS) he founded one of the nation's first TV station websites in early 1995. He was News Direcor at TechTV when it was founded in 1998. In 2001 he moved to London to become Executive Producer for CNBC Europe. Four years later he returned to San Francisco as Executive Editor for CNET's news.com.

12
Comments

Join the conversation!

Just In

put the hand down
kevinrs1 10th Feb 2009
continental drift may be moving Antarctica, but that's over millions of years.
0 Votes
+ -
http://www.globalwarminghoax.com

Total control of the 'peons' and the social elites will
enjoy all of the luxuries they have deemed sinful!

The horror, where is Al Gore someone call our
planet saviour he is our hope.



0 Votes
+ -
Warming is real, but--
gertruded Updated - 7th Feb 2009
Warming is real. The science is good. But I totally agree with you the
elites in our fascist United States will use the problem to squash us even
more.
0 Votes
+ -
Agreed.
TripleII-21189418044173169409978279405827 7th Feb 2009
Unfortunately for the agenda, the culprit appears to be the sun. Global warming is happening on Mars in parallel. I can't wait until "cap and trade" taxation helps stop Mar's global warming.

TripleII
0 Votes
+ -
Chicken Little
Lt. Dan 9th Feb 2009
The Sky is Falling, the Sky is Falling, the...

Ooops, sorry. I got carried away by the OP's blog post. So let me understand here - solar radiation increases global warming/climate change/Al Gore's fortune, warming melts the icecaps and glaciers, increased water and temps leads to more evaporation, more evaporation leads to more cloud cover, more cloud cover leads to less solar radiation, less solar radiation leads to cooler temps, cooler temps leads to more ice... Wait a minute!!!

I guess that's why all the doomsayers are now refering to it as "Climate Change." That way, they won't be wrong regardless of the results. In the interim, best to invest in carbon cap-and-trade stocks as Al & Co. will make their money, science be d@mned.
0 Votes
+ -
By elites you mean?
T1Oracle 8th Feb 2009
College educated people who use proper English instead of Bushisms?
0 Votes
+ -
Yes we will be living 3rd world
Christian_<>< 7th Feb 2009
And all of the politicians will be living like gods.
0 Votes
+ -
Interesting. Physics takes a holiday?
TripleII-21189418044173169409978279405827 7th Feb 2009
Since the earth spins, all the physics that predicts a bulge at the equator (you know where the spinning force is greatest) wont' apply. Instead, some magical process will work against centripetal acceleration wanting to cause the water to move to the equator so that the next "dire prediction" can come true. Amazing that.

So, I guess the world really does revolve around Wastington now? grin

http://www.space.com/scienceastronomy/planetearth/pumpkin_planet_021205.html
Between 1997 and 1998, however, that rounding tendency suddenly reversed, satellite data showed, and the equator seems to have been getting fatter ever since.
...
"Our solution to the puzzle is rather straightforward, and involves redistribution of water mass from high to low latitudes, in quantities sufficient to counteract the ongoing effects of post-glacial rebound,"


Don't let a little real science get in the way of dramatic headlines. How is so much garbage science published in so many places?

TripleII
0 Votes
+ -
Either way... the loss of D.C. wouldn't be such a bad deal... so long as all the politicians are there when it goes under! That would be the best thing for this nation. devil
0 Votes
+ -
unfortunately...
ca1ic0cat 9th Feb 2009
it will happen so slowly that even the politicians and bureaucrats will be able to figure out that they ought to leave....

But maybe we can chain Al "I invented the internet" Gore to an anthill on the mall.
This article is pure rubbish. I read how they did their testing and since this area is so large they could not have the proper amount of testing stations so the results were computer generated.

This after the prediction that the North Pole would be melted away by September of 2008. Hey.....it's still there and bigger than ever !

Al Gore would lose millions if we keep talking like this.....
0 Votes
+ -
*raises hand*
Spiritusindomit@... 9th Feb 2009
This will happen with or without any hint of global warming, the antarctic continent is slowly drifting northwards, which means it will melt anyways.
0 Votes
+ -
put the hand down
kevinrs1 10th Feb 2009
continental drift may be moving Antarctica, but that's over millions of years.

Join the conversation!

Formatting +
BB Codes - Note: HTML is not supported in forums
  • [b] Bold [/b]
  • [i] Italic [/i]
  • [u] Underline [/u]
  • [s] Strikethrough [/s]
  • [q] "Quote" [/q]
  • [ol][*] 1. Ordered List [/ol]
  • [ul][*] · Unordered List [/ul]
  • [pre] Preformat [/pre]
  • [quote] "Blockquote" [/quote]
ie8 fix

The best of ZDNet, delivered

ZDNet Newsletters

Get the best of ZDNet delivered straight to your inbox

Facebook Activity

White Papers, Webcasts, & Resources
ie8 fix