As Seas Rise, Maldives Seek To Buy a New Homeland 521
Peace Corps Online writes "The Maldives will begin to divert a portion of the country's billion-dollar annual tourist revenue to buy a new homeland as insurance against climate change. Rising sea levels threaten to turn the 300,000 islanders into environmental refugees as the chain of 1,200 island and coral atolls dotted 500 miles from the tip of India is likely to disappear under the waves if the current pace of climate change continues to raise sea levels. The UN forecasts that the seas are likely to rise by up to 59 cm by the year 2100. Most parts of the Maldives are just 150 cm above water so even a 'small rise' in sea levels would inundate large parts of the archipelago. 'We can do nothing to stop climate change on our own and so we have to buy land elsewhere. It's an insurance policy for the worst possible outcome,' says the Muslim country's first democratically elected president, Mohamed Nasheed, adding that he has already broached the subject with a number of countries and found them to be 'receptive.' India and Sri Lanka are targets because they have similar cultures and climates; Australia is worth looking at because of the immense amount of unoccupied land in that country. 'We do not want to leave the Maldives, but we also do not want to be climate refugees living in tents for decades.'"
But Australia has no borders (Score:5, Interesting)
Yes, but Australia, the country, is entirely contiguous with the continent. I can't imagine us (now or in the future) being very receptive to the idea of another country buying their way onto the continent and having to set up borders etc.
Besides, who'd want to move from a tropical archipelago to - let's face it - a desert? Sri Lanka is a much more likely candidate.
A simple question (Score:1, Interesting)
How much have the sea levels actually risen?
Makes me recall Bangladesh (Score:5, Interesting)
Nasheed's quote at the end of the summary really made me recall Bangladesh, where my parents are from. It's another country that is under major threat from climate change. I've often wondered what Bangladeshi people would do when the flood waters finally get bad enough to make the country uninhabitable, through no fault of their own (most of the people there are remarkably poor). I once read a touching BBC article where a village farmer complained that he was losing his country so Westerners could drive in their cars.
I always thought most Bangladeshis not killed by cataclysmic flooding would escape into neighboring countries, especially West Bengal in India, but the Maldives seems to have a "good" (at least practical) idea. Sadly the Bangladeshi government is too inefficient, corrupt, and schizophrenic to manage something as well thought out, costly, and long term as that.
I fully expect to have to explain to my kids that Bangladesh was where their grandparents were from but that it no long exists (above the ocean, anyway).
How interesting (Score:5, Interesting)
I hope he reads it, or a staffer does - seeing as he just got a promotion and might be a little busy.
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Generic Rhetoric Comment (Score:5, Interesting)
I helped a photographer assemble footage for a piece he's doing about this. He's gone there and stayed with Mohamed Nasheed for a few years running. The place is small enough that everyone more or less knows everyone. From what I saw they are incredibly pragmatic and dignified about this. They don't want a handout but would like to bring the world's attention to it. There are dozens of similar smaller nations that will not have the luxury of money to perchance buy their way out of this. I suspect, when this reaches critical mass, money won't be much of factor anyway. I hope the entire world will be able to be as calm and dignified and take a cue from the way they're currently dealing with it.
Srilanka or Kerala would their main options (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Floodbanks? (Score:3, Interesting)
Or how about buying a shitload of dirt?
Re:But Australia has no borders (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Makes me recall Bangladesh (Score:3, Interesting)
I couldn't point at someone and say "he is Bangladeshi", so I don't know if there are communities of Bangladeshi immigrants in London who are so tightly nit that they refuse to intergate, but for Indians and other peoples from that region of the world, they tend to become "Londeners" by the second generation.
The UK is not the country it was 150 years ago. London today is a very multicultural place.
Re:barely (Score:2, Interesting)
Here in the UK we've survived for generations on recycled water but Queenslanders would rather go parched than drink 'shit'.
Re:But Australia has no borders (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:Um (Score:4, Interesting)
Old chart of the Netherlands(not the same as Denmark, go read a map):
http://ivan.ahk.nl/kaarten/lagelandenromeins.jpg [ivan.ahk.nl]
Modern chart of the Netherlands:
http://ivan.ahk.nl/kaarten/netherlands.jpg [ivan.ahk.nl]
Massive areas were flooded in the Middle Ages in the Netherlands. Instead of hiding on high ground we beat the water and founded a nation that is mostly below sea level. It takes a certain state of mind to do this. Once you start surrendering to the water, you lose. And you will keep on running from any danger that comes in your path.
Re:Makes me recall Bangladesh (Score:4, Interesting)
The UK is not the country it was 150 years ago. London today is a very multicultural place.
That, in my experience, tends to remove people's sense of UK identity and tie them more strongly to that of their homeland. I worked with a Bangladeshi as my boss for a year in London, who was clearly second-generation or later. He still referred to Bangladesh as 'my home'.
Re:A myth. (Score:5, Interesting)
The USA has already signed [wikipedia.org] the protocol. It has to be ratified, though.
I'm a Democrat and think of myself as an environmentalist and even I'm skeptical about the value of the Kyoto Protocol. What's the point in the Western countries tanking our economies to bring down emissions if China is bringing dozens of new coal power plants online and adding millions of new vehicles to the road?
I would like to see progress made on green technology (which will translate into more jobs and economic recovery) so that we can bring emissions down and sell that technology to the rest of the World -- but why all of this focus on Kyoto when the protocol itself is inherently unfair to developed countries?
Re:Australia? (Score:5, Interesting)
Actually you're wrong. Yes the very center of Australia is harsh unpopulated desert. However there are also large stretches of the north coast of Australia which remain uninhabited. These areas are tropical, have large monsoons and could sustain a fairly large population. In fact it's been proposed for a while now that in North Western Australia there be more settlement of people/industry. (I'm an Aussie by the way.) I don't know how receptive the general population will be to a new settement in the north. Especially with heavily islamic Indonesia next door which does house terrorism. I'm sure the Maldivean people are friendly and all but I don't know what the general Australian population will think of it all. On the other hand it does look like the Maldives are pretty relaxed about morality considering it is a massive tourism destination, but I guess we'll have to wait and see.
waterworld...or canal world (Score:2, Interesting)
They could become the planet's first all ocean living nation, and start really developing that sort of tech (especially how to deal with more extreme ocean events...). Just start buying up old ships and refurb them to be floating houses, businesses, even little mini farms. Just a wild thought. I know if I lived there, I'd be trying to cob together a little floating miniark instead of building the traditional ..whatever they got, hovel/shack. Just a house that could float if flood water rise, a big raft, oil drums and logs, whatever. I mean this exists already as expensive houseboats, that mostly just sit tethered to a marina slip, but no reason they need to be so elaborate and expensive, just float and not leak that bad. With that said, carrying the concept further, there are a lot of boats and ships scrapped all the time that perhaps could be recycled, even if it was just into being barges.
Another option is massive terraforming, take what is the swampiest land they have, dig out thousands of miles of canals, use the dredged out soil to build up what good and higher elevation parts of the land they want to save, and just skip land roads for the most part, use the canals for transportation. They could start small, literally with what manpower and equipment exists (example: china terracing entire mountains for farming using shovels and baskets mostly), just small ditch canals wide enough to pass two canoes next to each other, then gradually work that out bigger until it can handle normal decent boats, then onto real ships and barges of whatever size work out to be practical. Of course, that means salt water everywhere, but seeing as how this will happen anyway if the oceans really rise....might be an option short of trying to find some donor space for what, 150 million people someplace else? 150 thousand can go be refugees, 150 million might start to run into complications even more daunting than a nationwide land reclamation/canal/lotta boats project. I don't know much about that nation at all, I would guess being so low they already have a lot of existing water based transportation and access. Just move heavy that way more.
Re:A myth. (Score:2, Interesting)
You forgot to explain why the warming happens (other than the "natural cycle" bit, which is about as useful as "God did it"). How do you explain the obvious and peculiar differences between the current warming and the previous ones? I'm skeptical of all assertions about climate change that aren't backed up by real evidence; people often get their information from politicians instead of science.
Re:But Australia has no borders (Score:3, Interesting)
Sri Lanka is a much more likely candidate.
A country that is fighting civil war to prevent an ethnically based breakaway state? If that is justified, how can selling part of the country be justified?
The war has also made people very nationalist, so giving up territory is likely to go down pretty badly. The Buddhist fundamentalists are not going to like having 370,000 Muslims added to the population either. See here [lankadissent.com] for one example.
The same objection as you have to Australia selling land, that it would introduce land borders for the first time, also apply to Sri Lanka.
Re:But Australia has no borders (Score:5, Interesting)
*sarcasm* Yes, specially since Australia has always been of the Australians, and nobody has ever tried to muscle their way into the territory before. It would be a totally new concept for the continent of Australia. */sarcasm*
Good grief. At least the inhabitants of the Maldives are suggesting to *pay* for the land they're looking at. 385,925 (July 2008 est.) people should be able to find a home somewhere and it saddens me to think that people's first reaction is like yours.
Having said that, I feel for the people's plight since I am a Dutch citizen. Lord knows we won't be keeping our feet dry easily if the water levels rise that much. At present, my birth place is already 7 meters below sea level as it is. Thing is that there are 17 million of us, not ~400000.
Sea level is falling around the Maldives! (Score:1, Interesting)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dIbTJ6mhCqk
Re:The lowest point in the Netherlands (Score:3, Interesting)
I hate to break it to you but Mother Nature/Gaia will always win. You might get lucky and never see that day but all the Netherlands is doing is postponing the inevitable. Something will change (earthquake or water rising higher than expected or whatever) or someone will make a mistake (engineering error or faulty construction or whatever) or _something_ and then Mother Nature/Gaia will remind you that she is boss. We live at her mercy. Seriously, not to be all new age-y but anyone who thinks they can beat nature is simply not paying attention. The history books are littered with civilizations who thought they could win the "fight." Here's a recent example - New Orleans was almost destroyed _by a storm._ Building a city in a region that is dangerous is stupid. Sorry to be so blunt, but it is.
Re:A simple question (Score:2, Interesting)
Why bother moving? I say rent a party barge or tanker (like in waterworld?) and anchor it to the island... Sea goes up, keep your country on the barge/tanker... Sea goes down, sell the land to the people on the boat! Sounds Win/Win to me.
That is assuming you'll survive the aliens that would escape from the frozen city beneath the ice of antartica, but Hey, who am I to split hairs.
this looks like a problem that needs a scifi fix (Score:4, Interesting)
There was a group of dreamers a while back with an idea they called the Millennium Project. One of their ideas for solving the population crunch was creating artificial islands to populate the empty reaches of the equatorial waters. I don't remember all of the details of their plan, it's been years, but the islands themselves would be created by pulling calcium out of sea water, I think using some form of electrolysis. You lay metal grids in the water, run a current, and the calcium grows on the grid like sugar on a string with rock candy.
The islands themselves would be like giant dinner plates floating on the water, but I assume with enclosed flotation chambers so a good sloshing wouldn't sink them as it does with the dinner plate. The goal here would be extremely green and low-impact living so the islands would generate their own power via green and renewable methods, crops would be grown on the upper surface, and waste would be recycled. The experience here would be less like a cruise ship and more like low-impact commune living.
The habitat itself would have a submerged lip around the edge that would be perfect for the formation of corals and home for shallow water fish. Even if the island were moored in deep water, it would be a a fine habitat, much like a volcanic island can rise from the abyssal plane and suddenly there's a nice shallow water habitat for fish.
The really cool part is that these islands could theoretically be free-floating, drifting with the currents and floating around the world, using powered propulsion only when pushed too close to obstructions.
These islands represent a fairly interesting idea in population management. Right now, we have too damn many people on the planet. Now I know we're not going to get people to reduce population the way we're living now, there'd be blood in the streets if anyone forced them to. And not doing anything will just lead to ecological collapse, mass starvation, wars, and the population will be whittled down through attrition. But if we could get people a safe, clean, sustainable standard of living away from the cycle of poverty, the west has already shown that birthrates will naturally stabilize and begin to decline. The problem manages itself without coercion.
I don't know how likely it would be but I think it would be extremely cool if the islanders could just build their own replacements and say "fuck global warming, we're ready for it." Maybe the Dutch can join them, not sure how much longer their dikes can hold out.
Re:Australia? (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:A simple question (Score:4, Interesting)
I love how that Wikipedia entry states, with absolutely certainty that the rising sea level is mainly a result of man-made global warming.
What I find interesting is that there is strong archeological evidence of populations thrived when the climate was warmer and the seas higher. One example being prehistoric Japan, 4000 BC to 2000 BC, when the seas were believed 5 to 6 meters higher. The indigenous population declined significantly when temperatures dropped.
These people on the Maldives would be screwed whether or not anyone wants to blame global warming. I suppose I'm being insensitive, but maybe they should have thought twice when they decided to settle land that's pretty much at sea level sitting out in the middle of the Indian ocean.
Frankly, I'm tired of this alarmist crap. I completely believe that the climate is changing, but when hasn't it been changing? This notion that humans are responsible for screwing everything about is about as arrogant, in my mind, as the belief people once had that humanity was at the center of the universe.
Re:A myth. (Score:2, Interesting)
Why can't we have environmentalism without the alarm?
Hmm... maybe because it's an urgent problem? It's like acting - you have to exaggerate your emoting in order to get the emotional point across to your audience. With the urgency of the problem (i.e. it's starting to happen RIGHT NOW), you need to make huge claims to get people to move just a bit. If you claim people in the Maldives are losing their homes due to global warming, you may get Phil in northern Alberta to carpool or take public transit instead of driving his SUV to work.
Re:A myth. (Score:4, Interesting)
Because if we didn't have the alarm, then people in Maldives would drown instead of buying new land.
Re:A myth. (Score:1, Interesting)
Because volcanoes put more carbon into the air that humans will in our entire existence on this earth.
Re:A myth. (Score:5, Interesting)
GCMs have energy conservation added to them by hand.
At least all the ones I've looked at do.
To a computational physicist that means they are non-physical. They don't and can't make any serious claim to modelling climate.
Attempts to compare the results of GCMs to actual temperature readings have shown more anti-correlations than correlations, and that's without even correcting for the heat island effect, which makes the comparison worse.
The use of "average global temperature" is unphysical. Temperature is an intensive thermodynamic quantity. It cannot be averaged in an inhomogeneous substance like the atmosphere. Atmospheric heat content should be used, but isn't.
So, anyone who takes GCMs seriously needs to answer these questions:
1) Why do you believe unphysical models are a sound basis for strong public policy measures?
2) Why do you believe disconfirmed models are a sound basis for strong public policy measures?
3) Why do you believe that an unphysical global average temperature is even worth talking about (that is, why aren't you talking about global atmospheric heat content?)
I believe dumping gigatonnes of garbage into the atmosphere is a bad idea, and that our policies should be drifting in the direction of reducing that. But I also believe that people who are making strong claims about the future of global climate based on GCM results are badly mistaken about the strength of their conclusions, and as a scientist I care far more about what is TRUE than what will motivate people to change.
It is wrong to mislead people in order to get them to change.
Re:But Australia has no borders (Score:4, Interesting)
The trouble with walls, as we saw recently in New Orleans, is that if they break you're fucked.
What we learned from New Orleans is that if you ignore 25+ years of warnings that you need to build a higher wall than you will be screwed if you don't. I hate to be cold towards those people, but the folks from NO were ass holes to a lot of people that went down to help them. The NO incident should never have happened. It was their own fault. Now all other US citizens are paying for their inaction. Now all those tiny communities around NO that got wiped out is another story; I don't mind giving government money/help to them. They at least were nice to most that came down to help them. They also didn't get nearly the news coverage of the big corrupt city that screwed itself.
Also seeing the things NO has totally wasted the federal money on really irritates me. A part of me would have rather just had most NO population moved out and dispersed around the country to never come back. If they need to rebuild/repair a port then they could build it up river on slightly higher ground.
As Seas Rise, sea level around the Maldives sinks! (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:A myth. (Score:3, Interesting)
3. Is climate change occurring at a rate faster than our models of previous climate cycles predict?
ANSWER: Yes.
4. Does climate change affect humanity?
ANSWER: Yes. It heavily impacts our food supply, living conditions and economy. Putting stress on those three things also destabilizes governments.
Re:A myth. (Score:2, Interesting)
I hate to tell you this, but computational physicists work with assumptions that would make a climatologist blush. Computational physicists work with systems that are computationally feasible - i.e. 2 particles interacting in a vacuum, solar system with a central "anchor", etc. Any model we have is non-physical - it can't be, it's a model. The only question is whether the model at hand can predict the future evolution of the modeled system. GCMs have been quite accurate, if a little too conservative.
From one scientist to another - if you're looking for truth in science, you're looking in the wrong place. Philosophy is concerned with Truth. Science is merely concerned with accurately explaining the natural world around us.
Re:A simple question (Score:1, Interesting)
A) The vast majority of reputable climatologists agree that human activity is a major cause of the current climate change trends. [nwsource.com]
B) According to the articles, the residents of the Maldives are trying to relocate to avoid the results of said climate change.
C) The president of the Maldives believes that their culture will disappear as they are absorbed into the cultures of the places they hope to settle [slashdot.org]. (The best I can do on that at the moment is to cite another slashdot post, but it's really common sense that if a country of only 300,000 is displaced from their native land and distributed geographically and over time into larger and established populations that their culture is going to be greatly diminished, if not lost completely.)
Is A -> B -> C so hard? Meanwhile there are a whole lot of other B's and C's out there as well. Including most biologists believing that we're in the early stages of a human-caused mass extinction [wikipedia.org] (not just as a result of global warming, but it's all pretty related).
So here are three situations for you:
1) If you walk into a hospital and unplug someone's life support to plug in your cell phone charger, is that "wrong" and does it make you a "bad person?" I'd say yes to both.
2) What if you're in the hospital waiting room and the cord you unplug runs through the wall first, so it's not that clear what you're unplugging? That's a bit grayer. You should probably figure out what damage you're doing first, but as it is you don't really know.
3) What if you're just plugging your phone into the socket in your house, but due to the nature of the grid and unbeknownst to you, someone across the planet will lose power to their life support as a result of you charging your phone? If you're unaware of the consequences, I'd say you're pretty innocent.
But what if, in any of those situations, you're explicity made aware of the consequences of your actions? I think that morally that makes the second and third situation equivalent to the first. You might not want to kill the person, you might just want to charge your phone, but that's the decision you're making, and I believe that's where we're at now with regards to climate change and other environmental damage.
And what great advantages are we supposed to be reaping by everyone having an SUV, again? It's like the above situation, but the battery on your phone is already reading full or very near full...
Re:But Australia has no borders (Score:3, Interesting)
Well, you only have about 90 years to prepare for the possibility that your birthplace will be 7.5 meters below sea level. Better get started right away.
Seriously, this problem is moving in slow motion - it's not like we're talking sea levels rising a meter a year or anything. Or even a meter a decade.