"Some people think, 'Let's put up sea walls, build New Orleans' type dikes and levees,'" Bergh said. "But that won't work for the porousness of rock and sand in the Keys."
Residents attending the meeting offered their own suggestions. One said the Keys should clean up toxic sites that could pollute the sea. Another suggested raising the roadbeds every time a road is repaved.
Already, though, scientists say the Keys have seen the results of climate change, from coral reef bleaching to loss of land. Standing in about a foot of salt water that now fills a 1950s mosquito control ditch on Big Pine Key, Bergh showed how the sea already has saturated the once-dry spot. Pointing at a dead tree, he said: "The pines tell the story."
Under the international climate panel's best-case scenario, Big Pine Key would lose 16 percent of its land to the sea and another 11 percent of upland habitat for the endangered Key Deer and other rare species and plants.
Under the worst-case prediction, the sea would claim 51 percent of Big Pine Key, and leave only 4 percent of the island's pine forest and hardwood hammocks intact.
"Whatever we do, we are just buying time," Bergh said. "Ultimately, the sea will cover this whole place."
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Information from: The Miami Herald, http://www.herald.com
Barry of CA @ Jul 24, 2009 17:32:17 PM
Buck Farack of FL @ Jul 13, 2009 10:54:10 AM
Blake Ives of TX @ Jul 13, 2009 03:34:27 AM