Discussion of climate, how it is changing, activism around that, the politics, and the energy systems change we need in order to stabilize things.
As a starting point, the burning of fossil fuels, and to a lesser extent deforestation and release of methane are responsible for the warming in recent decades:
How much each change to the atmosphere has warmed the world:
Recommended actions to cut greenhouse gas emissions in the near future:
Anti-science, inactivism, and unsupported conspiracy theories are not ok here.
Ron Guilmette, whose tennis court was destroyed in previous storms along the beach, added that he now doesn’t know how much his property is worth or if he will stay in the area. He calls the situation on Salisbury Beach “catastrophic.” “I don’t know what the solution is,”
Oh no, not your tennis court. What a shame. What a darn tragic loss for our nobility. Oh why can't the climate adjust to save your beachfront home. How could the earth be so inconsiderate for our rich land owners.
Won't somebody think of the property values??!??
They literally have children songs about not building houses too close to the beach
I'm blanking on this. What's the song?
Wise Man Built His House Upon the Rock Song by VeggieTales
Religious children's song
Wow, I had no idea VeggieTales covered that song! I didn't think it was even very well known outside Mormonism.
Incredible how quickly one's sympathy can evaporate, isn't it?
Just one sentence.
Ron Guilmette, whose tennis court was destroyed in previous storms along the beach, added that he now doesn’t know how much his property is worth or if he will stay in the area.
Not home - property implying one of many, and be owns his own private beach tennis court... But I mean I guess it could've been two words:
Ron, Billionaire
To be fair a lot of these homes have been there for 50-100 years (some way older). Salisbury (and parts of Hampton just north) is relatively poor compared to much of the New England sea coast, but those look like pretty expensive homes. Just a road or 2 over is a lot lower income. lots of fishermen lived there traditionally. That part of the Atlantic coast was settled and built before the idea of public land was really well defined unlike parts of California and the west coast.
I love this story. From people banding together and building a sand barrier on the beach to stop the ocean. To the idea that they MUST know sandbags exist but they never considered why people don't just skip the bags and dump sand, to not one person mentioning climate change or sea level increase even though that's clearly the problem, to the one guy saying "it's mother nature you just have to accept it". 5 stars, would deny climate change and fix the problem with sand piles again.
The best part is that their previous sand dune was removed by storms and high tides in 2022, so their solution was to build another sand dune, which took a year, and was immediately removed by storms and high tides.
You can't make this shit up.
When I first came here, this was all beach. Everyone said I was daft to build a house on a beach, but I built in all the same, just to show them. It sank into the ocean. So I built a second one. That sank into the ocean. So I built a third. That burned down, fell over, then sank into the ocean. But the fourth one stayed up. And that's what you're going to get, Lad, the strongest house in all of the coast.
You just know they went for sand piles because they didn't want to ruin their beachfront with more stable constructions.
I don't know why, but this made me laugh so hard. They thought they could keep the ocean at bay with a big pile of sand. Oh my sweet summer child.
I'm happy for the construction crew that got paid at least
They are waiting outside the town with more sand and their wallets open!
"Well sir ya see sand is a hot commodity these days, so my overhead is thru the roof. And I'm running short on guys... Yeah, double the price probably, not including t&m..."
I have no sympathy for anyone that builds close to water. It will ALWAYS win. I will never understand people who don’t take these things into account when buying a safe place to sleep.
They saw Netherlands and said "Fuck it, we can do it better!", then promptly failed.
Dutch dunes also formed naturally over centuries before the Dutch decided to add man made ones.
Exactly! Dutch dunes are mostly natural: beach sand is blown onto the land and started to pile up, eventually forming dunes. Even in the places where there are buildings facing the sea, they are at least 100(‘s) meters away from the coastline.
The man-made dikes are much more than just a pile of sand. To quote wikipedia:
Artificial levees require substantial engineering. Their surface must be protected from erosion, so they are planted with vegetation such as Bermuda grass in order to bind the earth together. On the land side of high levees, a low terrace of earth known as a banquette is usually added as another anti-erosion measure. On the river side, erosion from strong waves or currents presents an even greater threat to the integrity of the levee. The effects of erosion are countered by planting suitable vegetation or installing stones, boulders, weighted matting, or concrete revetments. Separate ditches or drainage tiles are constructed to ensure that the foundation does not become waterlogged.
I absolutely love being near (or on, or in) bodies of water. But I figured out that I would never want to live near one before I hit my teens.
Did they just dump sand in a big pile? Sand dunes are pretty well-understood ecosystems that require something underneath to anchor to as well as plants on top to stabilize them.
But also, the ocean is going to continue to rise, so any effort is likely futile. Sorry about that dude's tennis court getting ruined
So what your saying is they should have put the tennis courts on top of the sand dunes to stabilize them.
They can always sell their houses to Aquaman.
🪓
Here's another good one: The city of Long Beach, California spends close to that much every year to do the same thing to protect mansions built on a sand bar (the Long Beach Peninsula) that are about 50 feet from the water line on a good day. They just keep constantly moving sand from one end of the beach to the other end a couple miles away. That's city money. The article below has some details, but only refers to the city saving $100k to $300k a year by bringing the work in house. The figure I've heard is more like $500k a year. I imagine it's actually higher than that, even. They have dedicated big earth movers, a built facility to store and maintain them, employees dedicated to it, etc. Do the math. This is probably happening all over the country and all over the world.
https://www.presstelegram.com/2022/12/19/long-beach-moves-its-own-beach-sand-to-protect-peninsula/
Let me guess - the beachfront property owners have offshored their wealth and pay less tax than the neighbourhoods without such exorbitant demands?
Yeah well someday I might get rich, and then I'll want everyone else to pay for me!
/s
The upside is that this creates jobs. Yay economy!
/s
So the natural dunes washed away and the answer was to replace sand with...sand.
Reminds me of the castle built in the swamp bit.
Just sell your property, like Ben Shapiro has advocated.
Problem solved.
I hear Aquaman might be interested
Better yet, put Ben Shapiro in the dune. His gish galloping repugnance should hold back the ocean no problem. If not, well...
Why are they all confounded? Pretty sure they all have insurance that will cover everything. Wealthy people with beach houses have money. Money can solve any problem.
Insurance will say they will cover everything, except these very specific things which you can apply to most scenarios.
"Sorry, that's just wear and tear on your property"
Rich people are rich because they're misers who hate losing money for any reaosn,and insurance companies are nothing if not profit-driven and have a million ways to weasel out. So we all enjoy the shadenfreude. Whoever loses in this case, we win.
You know any rich person that likes to spend more than necessary of their money?
I don't think you understand how insurance works.
Good job ocean, we appreciate you and also hate those arrogant fucks
Hahaha fucking idiots. No one thought about this project from inception to completion. Plenty of coastal erosion projects around the world that DIDN'T fail and this implementation, if just one person gave a shit, could've been a success
How to I read the article with an ad blocker?
The modern web is so user hostile.
Are you using the latest version of uBlock Origin and Firefox? It let's me see the article with that combo.
Switch to uBlock Origin
I read it with an adblocker myself
Does it come with Zendaya?
Why would anyone consider anchoring the sand with vegetation? That would just ruin the view. Now burn more money, lackey!
Put my mansion on stilts? What do you think I am? Bl... Poor!?