"Studies of climate change and its impact on coastal communities usually focus on rising sea level. Now, scientists from MIT and Princeton University have developed a method to examine how multiple effects of climate change -- including the combination of sea-level rise and stronger hurricanes -- will affect storm surges that wash over sea walls and inundate communities, damaging buildings and infrastructure."
"As a demonstration of the new technique, the scientists quantified how hurricane storm surges would affect New York City. They found that coupled with climate change, there would be a dramatic increase in the annual risk of so-called “100-year events” that have a 1 percent risk of occurring in any given year. As the climate changes, such powerful storms would have a 5 to 33 percent chance of happening in a given year in Manhattan, the scientists reported in an analysis published online today in the journal Nature Climate Change."
Carolyn Y. Johnson reports for the Boston Globe February 15, 2012.
Advertisement 
