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The West Coast will see an ocean several inches higher in coming decades, with most of California expected to get sea levels a half foot higher by 2030, according a report released Friday. The study by the National Research Council gives planners their best look yet at how melting ice sheets and warming oceans associated with climate change will raise sea levels along the country's Pacific coast. It is generally consistent with earlier global projections, but takes a closer look at California, Oregon and Washington. Although the 6 inches expected for California by 2030 seem minor, the report estimated that...

Human use of water contributes markedly to rising tides. Climate change, with its associated melting ice caps and shrinking glaciers, is the usual suspect when it comes to explaining rising sea levels. But a recent study now shows that human water use has a major impact on sea-level change that has been overlooked. During the latter half of the twentieth century, global sea level rose by about 1.8 millimetres per year, according to data from tide gauges. The combined contribution from heating of the oceans, which makes the water expand, along with melting of ice caps and glaciers, is estimated...

The Marshall Islands is approaching extinction. The threat is not from a plague or a warring neighbor. It is the very ocean that surrounds this archipelago of islands and atolls located in the Pacific Ocean just above the equator. The math is as simple as it is deadly. As global temperatures rise, so will sea levels from three to six feet by the end of the century according to the Columbia University Earth Institute. The speckles of flat land that make up the Marshall Islands rise about seven feet above sea level. In a few decades, scientists predict that rising...

In a paper published in Geophysical Research Letters of the American Geophysical Union (AGU) earlier this month, climate researchers have found that another prediction in the UN’s IPCC reports — what Al Gore likes to call “settled science” — is simply wrong, and that IPCC’s predicted rise in sea level over the next century is likely not going to happen.

← Kilwa Kisiwani Gereza NASA’s Hansen thinks sea level rise will be accelerating – I think not, offering a new paper and updated story on Hansen to show why Posted on April 21, 2011 by Anthony Watts Dr. James Hansen, NASA scientist, advocate, and protestor with a rap sheet released a new paper (non peer reviewed) on his website recently. A video report follows. The paper is titled:Earth’s Energy Imbalance and Implications (click for PDF) Here’s a portion of the abstract:Improving observations of ocean temperature confirm that Earth is absorbing more energy from the sun than it is radiating to space...

By NATHANIAL GRONEWOLD of ClimateWire NEW YORK -- New York state is beginning to take the threat of sea level rise attributed to climate change seriously as a new government prepares to settle in next year. Starting Monday, state officials in Albany will gather with members of the public to discuss a recently released 93-page report that recommends major changes to development planning and conservation along coastlines from the tip of Long Island all way up the Hudson River Valley. Any reforms to come from the process, starting next week, would affect about 62 percent of New York state's population,...

JUNEAU, Alaska — Global warming conjures images of rising seas that threaten coastal areas. But in Juneau, as almost nowhere else in the world, climate change is having the opposite effect: As the glaciers here melt, the land is rising, causing the sea to retreat.

The state is urging property owners along the Massachusetts coast to elevate their homes 1 to 3 feet to protect against storms and the threat that rising seas will bring the waters to their doorsteps. more stories like thisIt's just a recommendation - not a requirement - but the message being delivered by the new StormSmart Coasts program is a sign that many municipal and state officials are concerned about the risk global warming may bring to property owners along the 1,700-mile Massachusetts coastline. "It's scary," said Vincent J. Kalishes III, Scituate's conservation agent, who took part in planning the...

Rising sea levels and melting polar ice-sheets are at upper limits of projections, leaving some human population centers already unable to cope, top world scientists say as they analyze latest satellite data.....

WASHINGTON -- U.S. government scientists Friday said the long-term outlook for global warming may be more dire than suggested by this week's United Nations' report, which they say doesn't fully address the impact of clouds and melting glaciers. Recent evidence of accelerated melting of glaciers in Greenland and the Antarctic ice cap came too late to be included in the report released Thursday by the U.N.-sponsored Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. Glaciers are among the largest sources of fresh water in the world and are contributing to rising ocean levels. Rising sea levels could expose population centers bordering the ocean...

The U.N. Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change released a slim summary today trimming down thousands of pages of its massive overall Fourth Scientific Assessment on global warming, which will be released in May. It is hoped that the "Summary for Policymakers" will be an accurate distillation. Hundreds of scientists have been involved in the review process, and it is safe to say that means hundreds of bored scientists, because there is very little in it that is scientifically new. For example, it will report with increasing certitude that humans are responsible for most of the surface warming that began in...

WASHINGTON - Later this week in Paris, climate scientists will issue a dire forecast for the planet that warns of slowly rising sea levels and higher temperatures. But that may be the sugarcoated version. Early and changeable drafts of their upcoming authoritative report on climate change foresee smaller sea level rises than were projected in 2001 in the last report. Many top U.S. scientists reject these rosier numbers. Those calculations don't include the recent, and dramatic, melt-off of big ice sheets in two crucial locations: They "don't take into account the gorillas — Greenland and Antarctica," said Ohio State University...