If your future loved ones plan to take a weekend trip to Washington, D.C. to visit the Lincoln Memorial 80 years from now, they may have to think again.
A new study suggests that 13,000 historic and archaeological sites along the east coast may be underwater by 2100, even if only modest sea level rise increases are realized.
“There are going to be a lot of cultural sites lost and the record of humanity’s history will be put at risk,” said David Anderson, a University of Tennessee anthropologist who led the published research.
“Some sites will be destroyed, some buried in marshes. We may be able to relocate some. In some places it will be devastating. We need to properly understand the magnitude of this.”
The study, published Wednesday in the journal PLOS One, found that the Eastern Seaboard is at particular risk from sea level rise and in some locations, like New Jersey and Virginia, the problem is compounded by subsiding land. Government estimates made this year predict that seas could rise by 1 to 4 feet by 2100, with as much as 8 feet possible. Even on the lower end of that scale, millions of people could be displaced and historical locations, including Native American and early colonial settlements, could be inundated.
“Putting a sea wall around the whole of the US won’t be an easy thing to do and would cause a lot of damage elsewhere,” said Anderson. “We are going to have to do a lot of planning as a civilization in the next 50 to 100 years and we have to take heritage into account.”
The study’s authors used topological maps to determine which areas along the coast were most at risk from sea level rise. For example, Florida has the highest number of sites at risk with a 3-foot rise in sea level, followed by Louisiana and Virginia. Climate change mitigation efforts could stave off some of the worst impacts, but scientists not affiliated with the study, like Harold Wanless, a coastal geologist at the University of Miami, warn that some losses are inevitable.
“We will have to look at how much effort we expend saving these sites over more practical things such as critical infrastructure or developing new agriculture resources,” Wanless said. “Our human history is important but there are a lot of new things to focus on. They will all need time and effort.”
Other experts said the nation is at a pivotal point and that decisions made now will have far-reaching implications for future generations.
“It’s going to be an important choice for government,” said Rob Thieler, a sea level rise expert at the US Geological Survey. “There’s land that is becoming uninhabitable right now and we’ve seen from the hurricanes this year that people have to leave not just from the flooding but because infrastructure and services become unreliable.”