Our+Changing+World-+Coastal+Areas+Assignment,+By+Benjamin+Nguyen

Our Changing World- Climate Change Assignment on Coastal Areas

Impacts on Coastal areas:
Coasts has developed majorly in the past decades which is making it more vulnerable to the increase of rise in sea levels. developing countries with weak economies and institutions will face the higher risks of being in danger, but low lying coastal zones of developed countries are seriously affected. But over the past 100 years, 70% of the sandy shorelines have been retreating. Around the world, our coasts are in danger, to erosion and rise in sea levels which is caused by global warming. Global warming is when the earth's global temperature has increased, making natural sources such as ice melt in Antarctica. Rise in Sea level is dangerous to pacific islanders due to them being unable to due anything to protect themselves due to being third world countries, leading them to migrate. If we don't do anything to prevent the rise in sea level Australia will become small enough to look like one of those pacific islands as well, due to the sea consuming the land and land being taken away due to erosion. Salt-water intrusion will reduce the quality and quantity of freshwater supplies, due to the increase of sea level can cause extreme high tides, storm surges and seismic sea waves to create more destruction. rising sea levels are already contaminating the underground fresh water in Israel and Thailand, in small atolls across the Pacific and Indian oceans and the Caribbean sea, and in deltas such as China's Yangtze and Vietnam's Mekong Delta

**Rise in Sea levels, how is Australia affected:**

Rise in Sea level could damage the key economic sectors, such as food production in coastal areas which is; making fisheries, aquaculture and agriculture are always vulnerable to being consumed by the sea. areas are risk are also tourism, human settlements, and insurance. The expected sea-level rise would consume most of the world's lowlands, damaging coastal crop land and making people migrate from coastal and small island communities. Coastal areas also contains some of the world's most diverse and productive ecosystems, which includes; mangrove forests, coral reefs and sea grasses. Low-lying deltas and coral atolls and reefs are sensitive to changes in the frequency and intensity of rainfall and storms. the coral will generally grow fast enough to keep pace with the rise in sea levels, but may be in danger due to the increase of sea temperature.

**Erosion, how is Australia protected and its impact to Australia:**

50% of Australia's coast is sand, and is able to change any time. In Australia, there is rarely any shoreline protection, how ever in some locations the shoreline has become a problem, due human interference and encroachment on the shoreline. there are coastal protection's that the government use, which is; breakwaters, groynes and seawalls which are built for the protection of erosion. what they do is harden the coast and reduce the ability to adjust naturally. But as a consequence, the defences which is left at the pretty far from the beach can be used to help the sea w ater pressure become stronger, which can lead to a major loss of land. Though Australia has a best strip of defence to in  the sea which is 35km between New South Wales and Queensland at Point Danger and Nerang Inlet, which is also known as the Gold Coast. The system that they use is a northerly conveyor belt of sand moving north from New South Wales across the border as an estimate of 500 000 m3/yr. Coastal erosion, is associated with the east coast cyclones. which has occurred at several points along the New South Wales coast. The way erosion impacts Australia is by when having high tides on the coast, it will be able to consume a portion of land along the coastlines and may be able to bring a house down and wash away into the sea.

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**Global Scale:**

The types of changes that are happening around the world is rise in sea levels, which is a major concern to pacific islanders due them them being a third world country which means they are unable to protect themselves from any of this changes, since they are unable to fend for themselves their land will be consumed by the sea or the waves crushing down onto their land causing the soil to erode. also due to the increase of temperature around the world, it will cause the coral to bleach making the major food sources of fish to disappear making them migrate to another location. The global average sea level has risen by 10-20cm over the past 100 years. the rate of increase has been 1-2 mm pear year, but it can increase 10 times faster. It is predicted that the sea level will rise by another 9-88cm by the year 2100. This is occurring due to the thermal expansion of the ocean water and the influx of freshwater from melting glaciers. the rate, magnitude and direction of sea level change will vary locally and regionally in response to the coastlines feature, change in ocean currents, differences in tidal patterns and sea water density. sea levels will continue to increase for over hundreds of years if, but will halt if the atmospheric temperature will stabilize.

Here is a prediction of what the world will look like if the sea were to rise: [|http://flood.firetree.net/]

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**Regional/Local Scale:**
__ **Vietnam:** __

The impact of increase in rise in sea level from global warming will be catastrophic for developing countries, such as Vietnam. the rise in sea level will impact 16% of the areas, 35% of the population and 35% of the GDP by 5 metres, if the Greenland ice sheets were to melt completely, it would raise the average sea by around 7 metres, according to research the Red river Delta and the Mekong Delta will be the most affected. The coastal line of Vietnam is 3,260 km long, extending through 24 provinces and cities, which includes 127 urban and rural districts, 21 towns and 6 cities. The landforms of the coastal area of Vietnam are multiform and diverse. Coastal erosion is causing many difficulties for the communities living along the coast. Coastal erosion in the North is usually associated with sedimentation which occurs in a complicated manner depending on the natural and human factors, of which the main ones are lithological composition of the coast and hydro graphic regime. Coastal erosion in Quang Ninh occurs locally within short coastal sections, but in the Red river delta, the coastal erosion occurs in long coastal such as the sedimentation near river mouths. coastal erosion has been found in all provinces along the coastal areas of the central region. There were records of 264 erosion sites during 1990-2003. Coastal erosion in Vietnam occurs at different rates. It depends on irregular or rugged land form, with many bays and peninsulas, bedrock, river moth areas. Erosion occurs with a small extent, low to medium intensity. Strong and very strong erosion occurs in convex coastal sections facing directly in the wind and wave direction, with sand being the main shore-building material, there are around 268 erosion sites composed of sand, which in percentage is 93.7% of erosion sites in Vietnam. In Central Vietnam, erosion occurs all over the coastline. The areas with the strongest erosion are concentrated in areas such as Thanh Hoa, Thu Thien-Hue, Quang Nam, Quang Ngai, Phu Yen. Erosion occurs in different types of coasts such as gravel, sand, mud clay, sandy mud. Coastal sections being eroded are over 1km long, 10.6% of coastal sections have eroded 200 metres towards the inland. 43% of the coastal sections have already been eroded, with a high rate of erosion 100m/year.

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 * Negatives:**
 * Loss of land
 * Loss of vegetation due to the increase in sea levels
 * Homes destroyed
 * Positives:**
 * If sea waters are going into rice paddies, the farmers can use rice grains that can grow by using sea water
 * They can grow shrimp farms

__ **Alaska:** __ Coastal erosion in Alaska has doubled up to 45 feet per year, in a 5 year period between 2002 and 2007, along the 40 mile stretch in Beaufort sea. It was said that in the 1950s and late 1970s, the erosion was 20 feet, but in the late 1970s and early 2000s it increased by 8 inches. It was predicted the the land loss in the coastline is a result of change in the Arctic condition, including the melting of sea ice, increase of summertime sea-surface temperature, rising sea level and an increase in the storm power and corresponding wave action. Any increase in the coastal retreat will further destroy the Arctic landscape, including loss in freshwater and territorial wildlife habitats and the disappearance in cultural sites such as villages and towns. The Arctic climate is leading to a rapid complex environmental response, both territorial and marine ecosystems, which will certainly affect the rate and pattern of the coastline erosion, the warming of sea-surface temperature and rising sea levels may weaken the permafrost dominating the coastline, by thawing out the ice coats. Along the southern shores of Alaska, the coastlines are rising due to the tectonic forces and isostatic rebound on the Bering sea coast and in the Arctic. communities living along the coast are experiencing increase in damage from storm surges, shoreline loss due to fierce winter storms and salt water mixing into fresh water supplies. A big impact of rise in sea level to Alaska is the sea ice, which is making the effect of storm waves on the shoreline intensively dangerous, increase of the wave height, decline of shore-fast ice leaves the coast unprotected from waves and vulnerable to waves and ice coverage decreases the damping effect on waves leading into the shore.


 * Negatives:**
 * Loss of land
 * Loss of vegetation
 * habitats are lost
 * Coastal erosion will increase due to rise in sea levels
 * Positives:**
 * Coastal erosion can remove unwanted land

**Evaluation:**



Rise in sea levels in the coming years would be one of the most disastrous impacts due to the increase in temperature. There would be a massive economical cost, social consequences and forced migration, which could result from global warming, it is predicted that the outlook of ruse in sea levels are caused by the emission of greenhouse gas and the pollution in the atmosphere. In the 20th century, the sea level has risen by an average of 2mm a year. but it has been increasing over the previous decades, the increase in lea level has gone up around 70% faster, if this is going to happen the erosion will then increase its occurrence around the world. Even if we try to stabilize the concentrations in the atmosphere and stop releasing green house gas, the sea level will rise continue to increase for several centuries due to the ice caps long reaction time , so it will be predicted that around 2-400 years the sea levels will return to an average of 2mm a year.

**Prediction:**
The main contributors of the rise in sea level is the thermal expansion of water and melting ice. The prediction of the future is the sea level rise from the ice melting actually came from chunks of broken glaciers that are drifting around the ocean melting at the same time, the calving process is increased due to the warming. it is believed that the sea level will rise from 18cm to 59cm by 2100. Coastal erosion will increase due to the increase of rise in level, we are unable to stop the erosion or the rise in sea level because of the emitting of carbon dioxide into the air.



Additional Information and Bibliography:
[] [] [] [] [] [] [|http://web.worldbank.org/WBSITE/EXTERNAL/COUNTRIES/EASTASIAPACIFICEXT/VIETNAMEXTN/0,,contentMDK:21233976~menuPK:387571~pagePK:2865066~piPK:2865079~theSitePK:387565,00.html] [] [] [] [] [] []