Study: New Orleans sea level rise is at 'point of no return'

A new study published in the Nature Sustainability journal highlights the urgency of New Orleans' climate crisis, stating that the city has reached a "point of no return" in terms of future flood risks, reports Oliver Milman in The Guardian.

"Ongoing sea-level rise and the rampant erosion of wetlands in southern Louisiana will swallow up the New Orleans area within a few generations, with the new paper estimating the city 'may well be surrounded by the Gulf of Mexico before the end of this century'." The city faces threats from sea level rise, stronger hurricanes, and the subsidence of the coastline. The southern portion of Louisiana could experience a 3 meter to 7 meter rise in sea level, which would cause the shoreline to migrate as much as 62 miles inland — which would surround the cities of New Orleans and Baton Rouge. 

According to the study, this makes southern Louisiana the "most physically vulnerable coastal zone in the world" and calls for "immediate action" to relocate New Orleans' 360,000 residents.

The city's levees, upgraded after Hurricane Katrina, are already not sufficient to save the city from the imminent threat. Jesse Keenan, an expert in climate adaptation at Tulane University and one of the study's co-authors, says "City, state and federal leaders should begin work to help support people moving away from the New Orleans region in a coordinated way, starting with the most vulnerable communities, such as those in Plaquemines parish who live outside the levee system." The below-sea-level city, Keenan says, is in a "terminal condition" and requires "palliative care." 

According to the article, "Since the 1930s, Louisiana has lost 2,000 sq miles of land to coastal erosion, equivalent to the size of Delaware, with a further 3,000 sq miles set to vanish over the next 50 years. The rate of land loss is so rapid that a football pitch-sized area is wiped out every 100 minutes."