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By CORAL DAVENPORT; photographs By KADIR VANLOHUIZEN

Some areas of the globe are especially vulnerable torising sea levels. As land recedes under advancingwaters, governments are faced with the costs ofbuilding defensive seawalls and relocating coastalpopulations — and in some extreme cases, findingnew homes for entire island nations. RELATED ARTICLE »

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Kiribati consists of 33 tiny islands and atolls, some uninhabited, sitting just feet above sea level and spread overan expanse of ocean the size of India.

Kiribati The low-lying islands of Kiribati, just a few feetabove sea level, are on the front lines ofclimate change. Globally, sea levels have riseneight to 10 inches since 1880, but severalstudies show that trend accelerating. If carbonemissions continue unchecked, a recent surveyof experts concluded, sea levels may rise aboutthree feet by 2100.

That could inundate most of Kiribati by theend of the century, and the islands, home tosome 100,000 people, are already feeling theimpact. The government of Kiribati says theintrusion of salt water caused by rising sealevels has contaminated fresh water suppliesand crop soil, and President Anote Tong haspredicted that his country will becomeuninhabitable in 30 to 60 years. According tothe United Nations High Commissioner forRefugees, all the residents of Kiribati, alongwith other low-lying island states such as theMaldives and Tuvalu, could be forced to flee asa result of climate change. “Entire populationscould thus become stateless,” the agencywrote.

The remote nation, more than 1,200 milessouth of Hawaii and 3,800 miles northeast ofAustralia, has already purchased 6,000 acreson the neighboring island state of Fiji toprotect its food security as the sea encroacheson its arable land — and possibly, in the future,to relocate its residents.

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Icebergs in a channel between Greenland’s Eqip Sermia glacier and Ilulissat Icefjord, the most active glacier inthe Northern Hemisphere. Greenland’s immense ice sheet is melting as a result of climate change.

Greenland A growing body of research shows that climatechange is rapidly melting the Greenland icesheet. In 2012, satellite observations revealedan “extreme melt event” in which ice melted ator near the surface of 98.6 percent of the icesheet. The summer melt season has beenlengthening as well: Simulated reconstructionsshow that it now lasts 70 days longer than itdid in 1972, and the extent of the ice melt in2010 was twice that of the average in the early

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1970s.

All of these factors increase the contribution ofGreenland’s ice melt to the global rise in sealevel. But while the effects of climate changethreaten the lives and livelihoods of people inlow-lying Pacific island states, they could be aboon in parts of Greenland. SomeGreenlanders hope climate change will helpthem achieve independence from Denmark,which colonized the island in the 18th century.

The immense weight of Greenland’s ice sheetpushes the island down into the ocean, so asthe ice sheet melts and the weight decreases,the island rises. Melting ice and warmerweather are reshaping Greenland’s geography,making once-frozen land arable. The thaw isalso opening up access to formerly iced-overreserves of oil, zinc, gold, diamonds anduranium. There is a small but growing politicalmovement in Greenland to harness the newwealth of resources as part of a push forindependence.

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The Kuna — about 40,000 indigenous people living on dozens of islands off Panama’s Caribbean coast — fearthat their ancestral lands could be submerged within a generation.

Panama The San Blas archipelago, a chain of more than350 white-sand islands sprinkled across theCaribbean coast of Panama, has been home tothe indigenous Kuna people for thousands ofyears. Now, rising sea levels and higher stormsurges are flooding their villages. Scientists atthe Smithsonian Tropical Research Instituteestimate that sea levels around the islands arerising at a rate of about three-quarters of aninch annually, and that the islands will beunderwater in the next 20 to 30 years.

The Panamanian government is developing aplan to relocate the Kuna to the mainland, butthe fiercely independent group is distrustful ofthe government, and many are resisting theproposal.

“The government of Panama recognizes thatmany of the people don’t want to move,” saidScott Leckie, director of DisplacementSolutions, a Geneva-based organization thatworks with people displaced by climatechange. “The younger the person is, the more

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likely they are to accept the move. The mostable-bodied and highly educated people willmove first. Thus, the least employed, the mostill, the oldest and weakest and most disabled,the least willing to move, will be the ones leftbehind.”

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Of the 50 states, Florida is the most vulnerable to rising sea levels, standing just a few feet above the currentlevel. Miami is in an especially dangerous position because of its porous limestone foundation.

United States While seas are rising globally, thephenomenon is not occurring at even rates

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around the world. A 2012 study by the U.S.Geological Survey concluded that sea levelsalong the East Coast will rise three to fourtimes faster than the global average over thenext century. While levels worldwide areexpected to rise an average of two to three feetby 2100, they could surge more than six feetalong the Atlantic seaboard. The study namedBoston, New York, and Norfolk, Va., as thethree most vulnerable metropolitan areas.

Another study found that just a 1.5-foot rise insea level would expose about $6 trillion worthof property to coastal flooding in theBaltimore, Boston, New York, Philadelphiaand Providence, R.I., areas. That raises hugequestions about the fate of Boston Harbor,where developers have poured millions intoconstruction projects. Planners are steeling fora future in which storm surges flood hugeswaths of Boston. They have put together aclimate action plan outlining how the city canbetter prepare for disaster.

Miami, one of the nation’s most populouscities, is built atop a porous limestonefoundation on the South Florida coast, makingit extremely vulnerable to rising sea levels,according to the federal government’s 2013draft National Climate Assessment. As Arcticice continues to melt, the waters around Miamicould rise up to 24 inches by 2060, accordingto a report by the Southeast Florida RegionalClimate Change Compact. Residents say theyare already experiencing the effects as roadsand outdated sewage systems flood. Theporous limestone creates a unique threat asseawater seeps through the city’s foundations.

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“You’re not necessarily getting water pouringup over a barrier — instead, it’s seepingthrough the limestone and coming up throughdrains,” said Leonard Berry, co-director of theClimate Change Initiative at Florida AtlanticUniversity. “It’s already happening. And it’snot very pleasant.”

A study by the Florida Department ofTransportation concluded that over the next35 years, rising sea levels will damage smallerroads in the Miami area, and that after 2050,major coastal highways will also experiencesignificant flooding and deteriorate as thelimestone beneath them becomes saturatedand crumbles.

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Produced by Joe Burgess, Hannah Fairfield, David Furst, John Niedermeyer, Matt Ruby and Shreeya Sinha.

A submerged burial ground in Fiji’s Togoru village, where the Dunn family has lived for generations. Thefamily, of Irish descent, has built five seawalls, but each one has been knocked down by rising waters.

Fiji Like its Pacific island neighbor Kiribati, Fiji isseeing the effects of the encroaching ocean,and the government has begun relocatingresidents from the archipelago’s outer islandsand low-lying coastal areas to the largermainland.

The government moved residents from thecoastal village of Vunidogoloa after salt waterruined the region’s crop soil. Officials are alsoinvesting in other adaptation measures: Theyare building desalination plants and watertanks on the country’s vulnerable northernislands, while continuing to make plans torelocate people.

At the same time, Fiji knows its plight is not asdire as that of nations like Kiribati and Tuvalu,which scientists say will probably disappear by2100. Fiji’s president, Ratu Epeli Nailatikau,has said he will welcome the fleeingpopulations of those countries, a gesture thatcould strain his nation’s own waning land andresources.

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Borrowed Time onDisappearing LandBy GARDINER HARRIS

Though countries like Bangladeshhave contributed little to theindustrial pollution driving climatechange, they will suffer the most fromthe devastating consequences.

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