Where it’s not worth building a family house “for centuries” and buying a place in a cemetery in advance: cities and countries that will go under water as a result of climate change on Earth

Scientists from the world's leading research centers have been trying to predict the consequences of global warming for many years. The worst of them is the melting of glaciers, which will lead to an increase in the water level in the world ocean and, as a result, the flooding of a number of territories, including large cities.

The numbers are different every year - some say that in a few decades almost half of modern megacities will go under water.

Others are sure that neither we nor our children and grandchildren have anything to fear - humanity will feel serious consequences only after hundreds of years. And yet, the fear of a new global flood is becoming more and more real every year - remember at least a large-scale flood in Europe, a flood in the Far East and the consequences of Hurricane Sandy in New York.

The forecast of scientists from the Potsdam Institute for the Study of Climate Change (Germany) says that by 2100 the level of the World Ocean will rise by 0.75 - 1.5 meters due to the melting of continental ice.

In this case, in 100 years Venice will go under water, in another 50 (by 2150) - Los Angeles, Amsterdam, Hamburg, St. Petersburg, and there are not far from other large metropolitan areas.

But Russia, in this case, is threatened not so much by water as by refugees from other countries - according to scientists, if the water rises by a meter, 72 million Chinese will be forced to change their place of residence. And where do they flee, if not to Russia, what do you think?

The forecast of Russian scientists was set out in the Climate Doctrine adopted by the Government and is perhaps the most optimistic in the world. But, nevertheless, the Minister of Natural Resources of the Russian Federation Yuri Trutnev, presenting the draft document, said that there is a real threat to our cities already in the century ahead.

Over the previous century, the water level rose by 10 cm, while with an increase in the ocean level by the same amount, by 2050-2070, a significant part of the territory of St. Petersburg and almost the entire Yamal may be flooded. With a growth of 20 cm, parts of the Arkhangelsk and Murmansk regions and a number of other territories of the country are at risk of flooding.

The forecast of the Scientific Committee on Antarctic Research: the level of the world sea can rise by 1.4 meters by 2100. Scientists did not calculate the consequences for the Russians, but if our experts consider even 10 cm a critical figure, imagine what will happen with an increase of almost one and a half meters!

Absolutely, island states will go into oblivion (Maldives in the Indian Ocean or Tuvalu in the Pacific), Calcutta will be flooded, and London, New York and Shanghai will have to spend about 15 billion dollars each on flood protection (the Americans calculated this figure for themselves) . 100 million Asians, 14 million Europeans will become refugees, and if the latter can still find a place for themselves in unflooded areas, then the former will most likely “flow” into Russia.

The forecast of the World Wildlife Fund (WWF) turned out to be rather vague - scientists do not give exact numbers, but they say that by the end of the 21st century, the consequences of global warming will threaten large cities with flooding, including St. Petersburg, Shanghai, Hong Kong and Calcutta.

Russian experts, however, commenting on the report, said that they were ready to vouch for the safety of St. Petersburg with their heads - according to their calculations, the level of the world ocean, while maintaining the current pace, will rise by 30 centimeters in 100 years, and nothing threatens the city on the Neva. I wonder why then their colleagues who wrote the national doctrine are even worried about 10 cm?

The National Geographic forecast is one of the most pessimistic. True, it is designed for an indefinite period, but the rate of glacier melting is growing from year to year, so that a thousand years may well be reduced to a couple of centuries. According to scientists, with the complete melting of glaciers, the level of the world's oceans will rise by about 65 meters, and the average temperature on the planet will increase from 14 to 26 degrees.

In this case, Florida, the coast of the Gulf of Mexico and most of California will be flooded in North America. In Latin America, Buenos Aires, as well as coastal Uruguay and Paraguay, will go under water. In Europe, London, Venice, the Netherlands and most of Denmark will be destroyed by the elements.

But scientists believe that Russia will suffer most of all due to the spill of the Black and Caspian Seas. The entire Volga-Akhtuba floodplain will go under water along with Volgograd, as well as partially Astrakhan, Rostov regions and the Republic of Kalmykia. In the north of Russia, St. Petersburg, Petrozavodsk and other smaller cities will fall into the flood zone.

After the pole shift, the Earth begins to rotate about its new poles again at some position relative to the Solar System, as it does at present. In other words, whatever part of the Earth is magnetic N, there will be a new N Pole after the shift. The pole shift, with the resulting magnetic realignment of the poles, will result in The new position of the equator passing through previously frozen ground. Greenland, Canada, Alaska, Siberia and Europe will be influenced by the new equator.

This will not mean that these areas will immediately flourish. Temperate zones, not those that will begin to flourish, will acquire a warm climate after the cataclysms, but with poor vegetation. Past cataclysms have constantly reshaped the earth's geography and climatic zones, as evidenced by the Earth. Continents, once one large mass of land, were torn apart, temperate or tropical regions suddenly froze and were hidden under ice and snow that never melted, and frozen desert lands gradually thawed and warmed, supporting life again. Mountains in areas prone to active mountain building were pushed higher, and shifting platforms unexpectedly slipped under the upper layers.

While the land is being rebuilt, the oceans churn around, but eventually settle down where it is lowest. Coastal places that were previously above the water level may now be under the waves, and also seams that have been flooded may now become land. How much land is pushed over the waves depends on how deep and wide the oceanic rips are, but historically land masses end up staying in the same place. Continents do not disappear, but layers bordering continents or hidden under the surface of the ocean may rise or fall, depending on the behavior of the plates near this place and elsewhere on the globe. If the behavior of the plates causes pressure on the flooded land from under the sea, then when the oceans calm down, there will be little room for water to settle, and, consequently, shoals in any part of the world can rise. Likewise, an unexpected failure at a mid-ocean rift can cause shoals to sink in any part of the world, but inevitably a failure is accompanied by a crack wherever the land is reduced.

After the pole shift, the old ice caps will inevitably melt and soften, while the new poles are covered in layers of ice and snow. The rates of these processes are not consistent, since the formation of the polar cap is stable only in the place where evaporation and melting at the ice edge corresponds to the accumulation of fresh snow after several centuries. Meanwhile, all over the world, the Water is rising for several hundred feet, and then subsides again. This process takes place gradually, so that coastal settlements have a lot of time to change places, and they will have to do this exercise many times.

So, the "scene is set" and the steps of moving the crust during the hour of the shift will be as follows:

1. As the S Pole captured by the N Pole of the passing 12th Planet moves towards north, then the crust breaks away from the core and is thus released, allowing the stresses that previously existed in some places to weaken. Therefore, Europe and Africa will move further east, allowing the Atlantic to break and expand as it slides north.


2. The most direct impact of the moving massive platform that houses Europe, Russia and the Middle East will affect India as the Himalayas move above her at this moment, effectively plunging this country into the abyss.


3. The impact of the Indo-Australian Plate diving under the Himalayas will loosen the tension along the African Rift so that it breaks rapidly, but does so in trembling steps with hesitant corrective pauses between twitches. In fact, the impetus that creates this gap is the movement of the African continent into Eastern direction.


4. In the process of breaking the Atlantic and pulling north or the North American continent, the already existing rift along the St. Lawrence Seaway rips even further at many points on the far side of the Atlantic, being essentially the weak link of this mass of land. Canada is moving north while the rest of the Americas are adjacent to the Atlantic Rift as it diverges.


5. When moving a massive platform on which Europe, Russia and Asia are located, on East it is also expected to break along the line of the Himalayas, forming, as we have stated, in the Russian lands an inland bay right up to the point where the northern part of the Himalayas is now located. This will occur during the hour of the shift, with jolts and rips along with the African Rift widening.


6. When the ocean zone adjacent to the Brazilian Bulge reaches the current N Pole, the crustal slide will stop, creating another drama. Large platforms of the northern hemisphere stop, and everything that followed them will be destroyed by them. In the case of America, this will lead to the destruction of Central America and the Caribbean.


7. In the case of an already eastward-moving Africa, strength will come from further its movement to the east, as the Indo-Australian Plate is already sinking, the weaker link will already be strengthened, and there will be momentum (in this direction).


8. What formed the former northern hemisphere will pile up in a common heap, and the compression of the Pacific Ocean will create a reaction, as the plates move under both Americas, then Japan will explode, and Indonesia will collapse.


9. This will release pressure from the platform to the south of the tip of South America and Africa. Since the Pacific Ocean, pressed against Antarctica, will change its shape with reluctance, the only place on the globe not experiencing squeezing of the platforms, will make it possible for new land to appear between the extremities of South America and Africa.

After the cataclysms, the existing polar ice will melt, re-forming at the same time at the new poles. Melting will occur faster than new formation, since more factors are required to form ice than to melt. Let's explain. The ice at the former poles will now be under the sun and the rate of melt will depend on air temperature and absorption of sunlight, which will be high as the old poles will now be located essentially at the new equator. Any water at the new poles will freeze, but ice buildup at the pole is not only due to the water that was there when the pole took its position. The build-up occurs due to precipitation, and they accumulate for more than a hundred years. At some point, due to the breaking off of icebergs and their drift towards warmer waters, etc. equilibrium is established. Therefore, the Earth will contain more Water in its oceans for some time after the cataclysms.

Scientists have calculated that the complete melting of the Antarctic ice will cause global sea levels to rise by 200 feet (60 m). This takes into account the effect of the melting of ice located above the melting line, its return to the body of water and leveling. More uplift occurs during the shift and for some time thereafter when the existing poles are under the equatorial sun and all active volcanoes in the world explode. What level of heat will be generated by the separation of the crust from the core and the core moving under the crust? How much heat is required to melt solid rock during the rapid plate over plate movement described by the West Coast Indians and witnesses of the last pole shift in the Middle East? How quickly does heat dissipate, even from the open ash of a campfire, or from a seat whose owner has recently risen? Most of Earth's surface after the shift will be covered by vast oceans that are fully warmed up with no cold spots, and cold spots will not re-emerge until several centuries have passed. The rise in ocean levels is also explained by this warmer water.

Due to the circulation of the mass of the core and heating resulting from the separation of the crust from the core and moving it under the crust all the surface of the earth will be heated to such an extent that heat can sometimes escape to the surface. What will be the result? There will be swelling of the earth mass, the earth's surface lying under water, the bottom under the oceans in many places will move to higher level, and the water will have to go to other places, and since the bottom is moving up, sea level can also only rise. Thus, the total rise in world sea level will reach 675 feet (206 meters).

As sea levels around the world rise 650 to 700 feet in two years, the survivors living below this level will repeatedly move to a new location as rivers begin to overflow their banks and wetlands turn into lakes. Those who map out their survival sites should also consider them as a way to rescue those survivors who might be trapped by the rising water. Survival sites should be chosen with the ability to connect with other landmasses that are also above sea level, so that technology and skills can be shared with other survivors. Surviving and settling next to what may seem like an endless sea will thus find that visiting each other is more possible than impossible in a new world without maps and, of course, without ship directions.

See maps of the area inundated due to the melting of the polar caps for 2 years after the 210m pole shift. Anyone can make a map for their region using the link sea level , the area of ​​flooding is highlighted in red.

The National Geographic project "If All the Ice Melts" offers a look at the map of the world that is formed after the melting of all glaciers: the level of the world's seas will rise by 65 meters and create a new relief of the continents. According to scientists, if humanity continues to actively pollute the atmosphere, this will happen in 5 thousand years.

It is always interesting to imagine very improbable, but in principle real things. What would happen if all the ice on Earth, which is more than 20 million cubic kilometers, melted?

National Geographic has created a series of interactive maps that show what kind of catastrophic consequences would occur on our planet. The melted ice, which would have entered the oceans and seas, would have led to a sea level rise of 65 meters. It would engulf cities and countries, changing the general appearance of continents and coastlines, wiping out entire populations.

Scientists believe it will take about 5,000 years for temperatures to rise enough to melt all the ice on Earth. However, a start has already been made.
Over the past century, the temperature on Earth has increased by about 0.5 degrees Celsius, and this has led to a sea level rise of 17 cm.

If we continue to burn coal, oil and gas, adding five trillion coal to the atmosphere, the average temperature on our planet will reach 26.6 degrees Celsius instead of today's 14.4 degrees Celsius.

So let's see what will become of the continents...

In Europe, cities like London and Venice will be under water. It will also flood the Netherlands and most of Denmark. The Mediterranean Sea will expand and increase the size of the Black and Caspian Seas.

In Asia, China and Bangladesh will be flooded and more than 760 million people will be underwater. Among the destroyed cities will be: Karachi, Baghdad, Dubai, Calcutta, Bangkok, Ho Chi Minh City, Singapore, Hong Kong, Shanghai, Tokyo and Beijing. The coast of India will also decrease significantly.

In North America, the entire Atlantic coastline in the US will disappear, along with Florida and the Gulf Coast. In California, the hills of San Francisco will turn into islands, and the California Valley will become a huge bay.

In South America, the Amazonian lowland and the Paraguay river basin will become the straits of the Atlantic Ocean, wiping out Buenos Aires, coastal Uruguay and part of Paraguay.

Compared to other continents, Africa will lose less land mass due to rising sea levels. However, rising temperatures will lead to the fact that most of it will become uninhabitable. In Egypt, Alexandria and Cairo will be flooded by the Mediterranean Sea.

Australia will have a continental sea, but it will lose most of the narrow coastal strip where 4 out of 5 Australians live.

In Antarctica, what was once land ice will no longer be ice or land. This will happen because under the ice there is a continental relief, which is below sea level.

What does Antarctica look like without ice?

Antarctica is the largest ice sheet in the world, but what is under it?

Scientists from NASA have shown the surface of Antarctica, which has been hidden under a thick layer of ice for more than 30 million years. In a project called BedMap2, researchers calculated the total amount of ice in Antarctica to predict sea level rise in the future. To do this, they needed to know the underlying topography, including wide valleys and hidden mountain ranges.

Some of the most impressive discoveries in Antarctica were the deepest point of all continents, the valley below the Byrd Glacier, which is located at a distance of 2780 meters below sea level. The scientists also received the first detailed images of the Gamburtsev Mountains, which are under a 1.6-kilometer layer of ice.

The new map is based on surface elevation, ice thickness and base topography, which were taken using land, air and satellite surveys. The scientists also used radar, sound waves, and electromagnetic instruments to map.

Warming oceans are already melting the West Antarctica ice sheet, and since 1992, about 65 million tons of ice has been shed each year.

Due to the melting of glaciers, Paris and London will become islands, a sea will appear in the Urals, and Russia will become an industrial leader.

Map of Europe after sea level rise. KEES VEENENBOS.

They say that global warming was invented by Al Gore, who worked as Vice President of the United States in the administration of Bill Clinton. It was Gor who ingeniously realized that with the help of ecology, you can make money (through greenhouse gas emission quotas) and put pressure on competing economies. This is how the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change and the Kyoto Protocol of 1997 supplementing it appeared, on the basis of which, on January 1, 2008, the mechanism for trading in quotas began to function.

However, it should be recognized that the climate is really changing and scientists are fixing it. This is not about some abstract increase in the average annual temperature by a fraction of a degree, but about the consequences that have a quite tangible impact on people's lives today.
For example, at the European Geosciences Union General Assembly conference held in April 2016 in Vienna, a group of scientists led by Marcel Nikolaus from the Helmholtz Center in Bremerhaven made a report from which it follows that the most significant reduction in the area of ​​Arctic ice in the entire history of observations will occur next summer. And specialists from the UK Met Office expect new heat records this year, despite the fact that last year, 2015, has already been recognized by them as the warmest in 146 years.

How Paris becomes an island
NASA and the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration estimate that global sea levels are now rising at about 3.2 mm per year. This is a lot: back in 2012, the process speed was only 1.9 mm. At first glance, the numbers are not impressive, but this process has already led to the beginning of the splitting of large glacial masses. For example, a piece of 12 sq. km. If the entire glacier slides into the ocean, this will lead to a rise in sea level by 50 centimeters.

And the matter is not limited to one Greenland glacier. In the next 10-15 years, the prospect of the complete disappearance of the polar ice cap in the Northern Hemisphere in the summer, as well as a progressive reduction in ice volumes in other places, including mountain ranges on the continents, is quite real. The UN predicts that over the next hundred years the level of the world's seas will rise by 6.4 meters.

It's time to remember that Venice and Astrakhan are only 1 meter above the current ocean, Kaliningrad and Odessa - 2 meters, Pisa and Bruges - 3, Vladivostok and Bangkok - 4, Shanghai and St. Petersburg - 6, Sochi - 9 meters.

Melting ice will globally change the map of the world. Australia, for example, will shrink by a quarter. The Netherlands - by 40%. The Dutch will definitely not be able to build even a 7-meter wall along the entire 451-kilometer coastline, and even protect the floodplains of numerous rivers - this is beyond the capabilities of the national economy.
In short, in 100 years the Netherlands will be the bottom of the sea. And they are not alone. Norway, Sweden, Finland, Denmark, Great Britain will turn into a handful of different-sized islands. Paris and London will become cities on the islands.
Most of Turkey, part of Iran and almost the entire territory of North Africa, including Egypt, will go under water.
Russia will be separated from Europe by a huge sea that arose as a result of the confluence of the Caspian, Black, Kara and Baltic seas. It will wash away the entire Baltic, except for a small part of the south of Lithuania, the east of Belarus and the northeast of Ukraine. Also, the Ural lowland will turn into a shallow sea, and the Ural Mountains will become islands.

Houseboats on the coast of the Netherlands. Photo: iagua.es

Good and bad climate change
Such global changes will cause many accompanying processes. For example, more than 800 million people live in Europe today. The flooding of its territory will create the problem of their survival, which means it will give rise to migration processes comparable in consequences to the Great Migration of Nations.

The progressive increase in average annual temperature will lead to a reduction in agricultural productivity in tropical and subtropical regions. It will become not only too hot, but also not humid enough. In particular, desertification could threaten the entire African continent south of the Sahara, but the prospect of a steppe climate there (as in present-day Kalmykia) is more likely, since a fair part of the black continent will also become islands.

In general, according to WHO forecasts, over the next hundred years, the number of hungry people will increase by 600 million people in Africa alone, and in the whole world it can reach 2 billion. For Russia, this will mean the opportunity to become the dominant world food producer. The current agricultural regions - the Don basin, the North Caucasus, the Lower Volga region, the Southern Urals, Altai and the steppe part of Southern Siberia - will be negatively affected by the aggravated water shortage during the growing season, which will reduce their productivity by 20-30%. But at the same time, global changes will make vast new parts of the country's territory in Siberia and the Far East accessible to normal mass farming. So far, soil fertility there is significantly lower than in the Chernozem zone, but the change in flora will gradually enrich the Siberian soil.

Geography and Economics
Despite the frank alarmism of the study, this scenario promises Russia much more advantages than problems. We, as a state, will be able to preserve not only most of the territory in general, but also the bulk of the most developed and technically developed areas. The flooding of part of the Urals and Western Siberia, of course, will necessitate the resettlement of 10-12 million people, but, firstly, there is where, and secondly, there is enough time for this. The problem with the resettlement of St. Petersburg will turn out to be noticeably more serious (especially if a decision is made to move the unique architectural complex of the city to a new location), but this is nothing compared to the densification of the French, who will be left with 10-13% of the country's territory.
And most importantly, Russia will be able to retain the largest part of its industrial potential, only a fifth of which is located at the bottom of future seas. In the US, this share is at least 67%, in China - 72-75%. The fact is that most American and Chinese factories are built in the coastal strip - it is more convenient to deliver their products to ports for loading onto ships. In Russia, the main part of the coast is northern, so factories had to be built on rivers. Changes will surely affect the role and place of our country in a globally warmer world in the future.

Of course, one should not take all these predictions too literally and straightforwardly. They are made by humans, and humans make mistakes. But we can say with confidence that the world is changing at an unprecedented pace, and tomorrow will not be the same as it was yesterday. Change is inevitable and global. But we have time to think, prepare and methodically adapt to the new reality.

It's time for humanity to say goodbye to sinking Amsterdam, Venice, Tripoli, Yokohama and the Maldives

The level of the World Ocean is rising due to climate change, and this process cannot be stopped, write Katerina Bogdanovich and Alexei Bondarev.

Englishman James Dixon is one of the few who considers the Maldives to be a great place to invest in real estate. It would seem that this is strange, because this chain of picturesque coral islands in the Indian Ocean is one of the most beautiful places on the planet. And the number of people wishing to spend their holidays in the Republic of Maldives is growing every year.

In fact, all these people are in a hurry to visit the Maldives before they drown, laughs Dixon, the owner of a small British IT company, who is thinking about retiring and moving away from the bustling City of London. And the fact that the Maldives will be one of the first victims of global warming brings a special flavor to his plans.

The Briton closely monitors the latest climate forecasts and believes that the Maldives will have enough buoyancy for his lifetime.

However, going to invest in the purchase of a plot on the islands, he is aware that for his children the benefits of such an inheritance will be very doubtful.

In the middle of the century it will be possible to begin to say goodbye to Bermuda and some other island states. Warming will hit Europe as well.

Climatologists predict several global scenarios for rising sea levels. And even the most optimistic one, according to which this indicator will grow by only 1.5-2.0 m by the end of the century, still assumes that humanity is saying goodbye to the Maldives.

More pessimistic (and at the same time more reliable, according to some experts) scenarios suggest that many of the picturesque atolls will be below sea level in a few decades.

Dixon is convinced that just then it will be possible to earn extra money on some small hotel in the Maldives. “If the flow of tourists to the Maldives has grown in recent years just because the country has become more talked about in the news due to flooding, then imagine what will happen when the islands really start to go under water,” Dixon argues.

The flooding of the Maldives is slow, so tourists have nothing to fear, the Briton notes, but there will be a great temptation to come every year to see if your favorite restaurant has already flooded.

And the Maldives is not the only sacrifice humanity will make to global warming. In the middle of the century it will be possible to begin to say goodbye to Bermuda and some other island states. Warming will hit Europe as well.

The pride of Italy, the famous Venice, continues to sink: according to the latest data, this happens at a rate of 2 to 4 mm per year, and the process, contrary to previous studies, has not stopped for a year. Diving into the waters of the Adriatic scares the residents of Venice and local authorities, but it has a positive effect on the local tourism business: the news that the city is sinking appeared in March this year, and already in April, prices in Venetian hotels soared by 52%, reaching an average of 239 euro per day - the same is the cost of living in hotels in Geneva, recognized as the most expensive in Europe.

In total, by 2100, at least 100 million people will have to be relocated away from the advancing waves.

Those who are kept from the pursuit of elusive beauty by a modest budget may be comforted by the fact that the fate of Venice and the Maldives will sooner or later befall most of the planet.

By the end of the century, rising ocean levels will seriously reshape the map of the world. In addition to the Maldives, Bermuda and Venice, entire pieces of the current coast of the United States, a significant part of Holland, large territories in Italy, Denmark, Germany, Poland, and Spain will go under water. China and Japan will suffer greatly from the onset of the ocean - Shanghai and Yokohama will be flooded. Warming will also not spare Ukraine: the Black Sea threatens to swallow up Kerch, Feodosia, Evpatoria and Odessa.

In total, by 2100, at least 100 million people will have to be relocated away from the advancing waves. The first consequences of this process will be felt by humanity in the coming decades.

“Sea-level rise is an invisible tsunami that gathers strength while we do nothing,” warns Ben Strauss, a spokesman for research organization Climate Central. – We are running out of time in order to have time to prevent the worst consequences of the “big water”.

irreversible process

Kenneth Miller, a professor at Rutgers University in New Jersey, believes that the rise of today's oceans will engulf the world's coastlines and damage 70% of the world's population.

Last year's report by the scientific group Arctic Monitoring and Assessment Program, which brings together about 100 climatologists from eight countries, claims that by the end of the next century, sea levels will rise by 1.6 m compared to 1990.

In the coming centuries, sea levels will rise by 4 to 6 meters as Antarctic and Greenland glaciers melt like pieces of ice on a pavement in the heat of summer.

Further more. “In the coming centuries, sea levels will rise by 4 to 6 meters as the Antarctic and Greenland glaciers melt like pieces of ice on a pavement in the heat of summer,” paints a depressing picture Jeremy Weiss, senior research fellow at the Department of Geological Sciences at the University of Arizona .

In fairness, it should be noted that it is not only human activity that warms up the atmosphere, and with it the oceans. In April of this year, another methane leak was discovered at the bottom of the Arctic Ocean - a gas, along with carbon dioxide, which is “responsible” for the greenhouse effect.

Scientists have noticed huge bubbles rising from under the water, reaching up to 1 thousand meters in diameter, before, but the fact that they are becoming more and more speaks of an alarming dependence: warming melts underwater permafrost, and gas deposits are released from under the ice, which accelerates warming.

water world

In addition to Venice and the Maldives, many other large and famous cities and states should prepare for the “big water”.

Danger lurks not only the islands, lost in the endless expanses of the heaving oceans. Melting ice will be catastrophic for continental states.

By 2050, the famous island resorts of Tuvalu and Kiribati may be completely submerged.

Climatologists predict a bleak future for Miami, New Orleans and several hundred other US coastal cities. According to a recent study by scientists from the University of Arizona, even if the level of the World Ocean rises by “only” 1 m by the end of the century (and this is an incredibly optimistic forecast), then all these cities will suffer serious damage. And a much more realistic 1.5-2.0 m increase to the current water level will be disastrous for them.

“The consequences of sea level rise could be soil erosion, flooding and permanent flooding,” Weiss warns. Strauss adds New York to the wet list and argues that South Florida is most at risk.

Asia will not escape significant destruction. Huge territories will be flooded in China, including the area in which the giant metropolis of Shanghai is located. Brazil and Argentina in South America will be hit hard.

The flood will not bypass Ukraine either: the list of likely victims includes, in particular, the Crimean cities of Feodosia and Kerch. Ukrainian scientists also name other objects. “Even today, Evpatoria and Odessa are suffering from sea level rise,” says Yuriy Goryachkin, senior researcher at the Marine Hydrophysical Institute of the National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine.

Evpatoria and Odessa are already suffering from rising sea levels

According to scientists, a 2 m rise in water will leave 48 million Asians, 15 million Europeans, 22 million South Americans and 17 million North Americans, as well as 11 million inhabitants of the African continent, 6 million Australians and 440 thousand islanders in the Pacific Ocean homeless . In subsequent centuries, when the water rises by 4-7 m, even more frightening consequences can be expected.

However, according to some experts, the possibility of a more rapid development of events is not ruled out. Most of the current estimates are based on a 2°C increase in mean annual temperature. However, in the spring of this year, a group of scientists from the US and Europe published a forecast according to which it is necessary to talk not about 2 ° C by 2100, but about 3 0 C by 2050. Calculations and forecasts are available at climateprediction.net.

The Kyoto Protocol has not worked, and the main culprits of pollution - the United States, India and China - have so far only declared their intentions to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, the researchers say. It is too late. Pessimistic forecasts show that the level of the World Ocean can rise by 7 m within 100-150 years. Then not only Venice, Shanghai and Miami, but also Copenhagen, Yokohama, Tripoli and most of southern Ukraine will be under water.

Rescue of the drowning

Fighting global warming is like fighting windmills, says Canadian columnist Mike Flynn. From big industrialists unwilling to cut their profits, to ocean-floor methane reserves rushing to freedom, it's about fighting relentless enemies, Flynn says.

In his opinion, the authorities of the Maldives did the right thing by opening a special account in 2008, to which part of the income from tourism will be transferred. These funds will be used to purchase land in Australia or India.

“We need to save for a rainy day,” ex-president Mohamed Nasheed explained this decision. “So that in case one of the citizens wants to move from here, he has such an opportunity.”

Official negotiations on the possible resettlement of 350 thousand islanders have not yet begun, and residents of other sinking islands - the Pacific Nauru and Tuvalu - have already lined up for Australian allotments. And the authorities of the Kiribati atoll in April began negotiations with the government of Fiji on the purchase of 2.5 thousand hectares of land.

“We hope we don't have to move everyone to this piece of land, but if it becomes absolutely necessary, we will,” said Anote Tong, leader of 103,000 Kiribati.

In Europe, the approach to solving the problem is different. By 2014, the construction of MOSE, a new protection system consisting of mobile locks and capable of withstanding a rise in water up to 3 m, should be completed in Venice (the current hydraulic structures are designed only for a 1.1-meter flood).

Dutch scientists are also involved in the development of dams: in a country where most of the territory is below sea level, this issue plays a vital role.

“The lives of millions in our country depend on how effectively the system of dams and other barriers works,” says Guus Stelling, an employee of the Deltares Research Institute.

No measures are being taken either in Odessa or Evpatoria, and no one is going to do it

The Flood Control 2015 project, which is being worked on by global technology corporations, such as IBM, together with Dutch engineers and scientists, will be able to prevent floods.

“Previously, a whole army of volunteers monitored the condition of the dams, but now special electronic sensors will be used,” describes the essence of the project, Peter Drike, an employee of Arcadis, one of the development companies.