Buildings vs. the sea

By Craig Welch, ENVIRONMENT writer

Humans take comfort in the idea of past as prologue. Our own lives move fast enough; the possibility of rapid changes in the world around can be unnerving. So, we lean on the things we find consistent. Baseball season starting in spring. Canada staying colder than the Mojave Desert. Cities growing and evolving—but not sinking into the sea.

Two recent tragedies focused new attention on just how quickly the world we know is changing, prompting conversations about how we must prepare.

In Surfside, Florida, as emergency crews continue sifting through the rubble of a condominium tower that fell to the ground with as many as 160 people inside, building experts and public officials are already talking about sea level rise. As my colleague Laura Parker notes, that’s not because any clear evidence has surfaced connecting climate change to the collapse of Champlain Towers on June 24—it has not. But when a 40-year-old building crumbles to dust in the middle of the night, it raises troubling questions about what else is coming and whether or not we’re ready.

Investigators scouring the rubble are exploring many factors, from cracks in support columns, to delays by a homeowners’ group in carrying out repairs, to an environmental risk that’s been known for a century: the effects of saltwater on buildings. As Parker writes, if mountains of building codes and armies of inspectors can’t keep a condominium safe today, what will protect oceanfront residents in coming years as “sea-level rise could dramatically eat away the beaches where towers now stand, and spread saltwater intrusion further inland, worsening its corrosive effects?” (Pictured above, oceanfront residences in Sunny Isles Beach, Florida.)

And yet, Miami’s coastal construction boom rages on, even as experts like Hal Wanless, at the University of Miami, suggest accelerated melt of polar ice sheets could increase sea level rise beyond government projections. “We could well be two or three feet by mid-century,” Wanless says, noting those rises will occur within a 30-year mortgage cycle.

The disconnect, one former South Miami mayor says, is that it still seems incomprehensible that vast tracts of solid ground will give way to flooding. It’s hard for people to get their heads around the idea that land simply won’t be there. “They can hear you say it,” he says, “but they don’t have a mental construct for this kind of thing happening.”

A similar disconnect happened in Lytton, British Columbia. Temperatures, boosted by climate change, soared to never-before-seen heights across the Pacific Northwest and Canada for three consecutive days, leading to hundreds of deaths. But when tiny Lytton, B.C., broke its country’s all-time heat record, ticking up to 121 degrees on June 29, the phenomenon was so surreal tourists flocked to the tiny village.

But the following day, hundreds of thousands of lightning strikes ignited fires in Canada in one of the most extreme events meteorologists had ever seen. By week’s end, 90 percent of Lytton was gone, destroyed by a raging wildfire that killed two people. (The cause is still under investigation.) Some residents are still missing.

Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau tacitly acknowledged the past can no longer be our barometer. “Realistically we know that this heatwave won’t be the last,” he said. B.C. Prime Minister John Horgan got right to the point. The Lytton tragedy, he said, is something “we’re not accustomed to in a temperate rainforest.”

If you want to get this email each week, join us here and invite a friend.

PLANET SMART

Saving the Florida panther: The Sunshine State is turbo-charging a plan to expand corridors for wildlife to maintain habitats despite increasing development pressures on the state. The plan, championed by photographer Nat Geo Explorer Carlton Ward Jr., was signed into law last week. It could help preserve the endangered Florida panther, whose numbers are on the rebound but are threatened by traffic. In National Geographic’s April issue, Ward shows what’s at stake for wildlife—and Florida itself. (Above, a Florida panther walking during the dry season in Florida Panther National Wildlife Refuge.)

Related: How wildlife highway overpasses make animals—and people—safer

FIND OUT MORE 

TAKE FIVE

• Hurricane categories don't tell the whole story (pictured above, ‘downgraded’ Hurricane Florence in 2018)
• Eat this! The most sustainable foods from seaweed to venison
• The hidden toll of July Fourth fireworks
• Home improvement could be a first step toward climate justice
• Lawn care is going electric. And the revolution is here to stay.

ONE MOMENT

Cooling off: Every summer, professional dog mushers bring their sled dogs to live on glaciers near Juneau, Alaska, where they can enjoy snow and cool weather year round, and tourists visit the kennels by helicopter to go on a dog sled ride with champion canine athletes. Most glacier sled dog operations were shut this past summer due to COVID-19. Meanwhile, many glaciers like the Herbert (pictured above) are rapidly receding as a result of climate change, another challenge for maintaining sled-dog camps in the summer.

Dig deeper: New way to measure Antarctic snowfall helps predict the ice sheet’s survival

Protecting animals: How we can help coral and seabirds survive a warming world

IN A FEW WORDS

HOW YOU CAN HELP KEEP THE PLANET CLEAN

Sprucing up the backyard? You’ll find many eco-friendly options for outdoor accessories, from hardy, brightly patterned mats that once were soda bottles (pictured above) to biodegradable doormats made from coconut husks. The colorful mats are among five small actions to help the planet from the August issue of National Geographic. Subscribers can read more here.

READERS TAKE ACTION: More than 100 readers responded when we asked in last week’s newsletter how they were going on a fossil fuels diet. Here are a few of their ideas (and thanks to everyone who wrote):

—Install a solar water heater: Jose Moreno says he installed two—and eliminated fossil fuels energy usage for that part of his energy bill. He saves more by driving a hybrid, he writes from Atizapán de Zaragoza, Mexico.
—Put in a white cool roof: That’s just one of many changes Andrea Venn’s family in California made. Here’s how it can help, particularly in warmer climates.
—Downsize? That’s what Nita Zepeda did, moving from 3,000 square feet to 600 square feet, and adding CFC lights, on-demand hot water, insulation, and a ductless HVAC to her 1924 house.
—A bit of everything: Jane Costlow of Maine reports her family has an electric car, two solar pumps, a mostly meat-free diet, and they can walk to most necessities (groceries, library, etc.).

FAST FORWARD

Explore the sky: Show kids the importance of the sky by helping them make a telescope. The sky and atmosphere protect the Earth from harmful radiation and keep the planet at a healthy temperature, Ella Schwartz writes in our fifth Planet Possible family challenge.

Challenges 1-4: Miss the previous Planet Possible family challenges? Join in the fun here.

TAKE CHALLENGE 5