Sea Levels 'Impossible' To Defend Against

[BASEL]

As fears grow of a metre sea level rise by the end of the century, the Environment Agency has told Sky News Online it is impossible to defend all of Britain's coastline.

Many places along the UK's East Coast will become particularly vulnerable to flooding.

The Environment Agency (EA) is already planning new defences. It has chosen to spend £50m on protection in Ipswich, including a new barrier, like that already across the Thames.

Just along the coast, Jaywick near Clapton has also been given sea defences to protect the 2,600 homes that lie almost at sea level.

But with 1.7 million properties in flood risk areas in the UK, many other places will not be as lucky.

EA chairman Lord Smith told Sky News Online: "We're not going to be able to protect every single inch of coastline. We've got something like 2 thousand miles of sea defences already that we have to maintain, that we have to keep in order.

"There are some places where even if we had a completely bottomless purse, er, we wouldn't be able to defend... Happisborough I'm afraid is one of those.''

The village of Happisburgh in Norfolk is fast losing its battle with the sea.

For years, residents have watched as cliffs supporting their houses have crumbled.

Diana Wrightson feels the government has abandoned them: ''It's disappeared very quickly," she said.

"One year we lost eight metres from the front. This year we've lost one, so you cannot tell how fast it's going to happen. It depends on the weather and the tides."

A metre rise would mean many areas of the UK would be inundated, particularly along the East Coast, if new defences are not built.

Hull, East Anglia, much of the Thames Estuary and Portsmouth are among the main areas at risk.

For most of the UK, storm surges, fuelled by extreme weather, will cause the most damage.

Professor Tim Lenton from the University of East Anglia told Sky News Online the East Anglian coast will be worst hit.

He said: "We know when that mixture goes wrong and we get the high tide and the weather and the wind behind it - on the back of a risen global sea level - then we have the concern for big flooding events."

A recent report predicted the cost of damage from sea levels rising could increase from £1.5bn a year to £21bn a year by the 2080's.

So while protecting most places may be possible, the question is whether the huge Government investment needed for the defences will be forthcoming.

[cyberjack]

...Its all very concerning and has obviously a lot to do with global warming etc...anyone who lives close to costal areas
will probally need to rethink their location within the next 20-30 years..but on a more local point of view .. it kinda makes you wonder..
why our local council ( in their infinate wisdom ) spent all that money recently on costal sea defences around
the lower ards / strangford lough parimeter?do they know something we don't??
(bearing in mind the a.b.c. arn't reknowned for spending tax payers money wisely ..) worrying times indeed ..
...i remember approx 30 years ago ..
(and speaking as a native of the west winds estate ) ...
as a kid .. the water from strangford lough used to meet us at our front doors at high tide..and apparently, in prehistoric times,
the lough used to almost cover scrabo hill ..lets hope we never see this in our lifetime , but globally, it is enevitible ...

[BASEL]

yes it certainly makes you wonder about ards, that's why i posted it, but for an example, what if the tide where to rise 1 meter then the present sea defences would be totally useless, and to be quite truthfull about the whole affair its not man made global warming that's the reason that just the scam to full us all into carbon taxes and such, if you look a studies that nasa has completed the whole solar system is heating up not just the earth, ice caps are melting on Mars and Saturn.

Be very careful people what you buy into that's my only advice

Also i like the way thy have told us that it is impossible to defend against


Basel