Sea Levels Rise and Floods Intensify, So Governments Consider Managed Retreat

Managed retreat is not a low-regrets option, nor is it easily reversed,” Miyuki Hino, then a Stanford University doctoral student, wrote for UK-based climate site Carbon Brief in March 2017. “There are social and psychological difficulties in moving people from their homes — particularly if it involves loss of cultural heritage or moving a family from their ancestral lands.”

Buying Land in Other Countries to Rehome Citizens
Kiribati, an archipelago of 33 islands in the central Pacific just barely above sea level, is among the first countries in the world to be threatened by the rising ocean. Some of its islands are already uninhabitable.

With the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change predicting a global average sea level rise of between 15 and 30 centimeters (6 to 12 inches) by 2050,  Kiribati is running out of options. In 2014, the government bought land in Fiji so its citizens could relocate, though the government recently announced plans to use that land for farming to help feed its people, in cooperation with China. It’s also working with Australia and New Zealand to develop programs that will give people the necessary skills to find jobs, should they be forced to migrate.

Giving Residential Areas Back to Nature
Learning to live with climate change can also mean tearing down existing structures and using the land for the greater good. In the US state of New Jersey, the government has been buying private residences in areas deemed vulnerable to storms or flooding linked to climate change. It’s turning that land into recreational and conservation areas that, as the state’s Department of Environmental Protection puts it, “will serve as natural buffers against future storms and floods.”

The voluntary Blue Acres Program, first launched in the 1990s, was expanded after Superstorm Sandy devastated the area in 2012. The program has since demolished more than 700 homes in the floodplains of the Delaware, Passaic and Raritan rivers and their tributaries.

New Jersey is going to have a wetter, more flooded future, and making Blue Acres proactive is reflecting that reality,” Shawn M. LaTourette, New Jersey’s environmental protection commissioner, told NJ Spotlight News in October. “The question will be how many properties can the state buy, how much it will ultimately cost, and how many willing sellers there will be.”

People who live close to the sea aren’t always willing to let their land be reclaimed by the encroaching waves. “Allowing water to come closer is a frightening concept for the average human being,” Hans-Ulrich Rösner, who heads up the Wadden Sea office of the conservation group the World Wildlife Fund for Nature, told DW in December 2019. “You can only do it when people are convinced.”

Creating One of Europe’s Largest Floodplains by Transforming Floodplains 
That was the case at a site in the Humber Estuary in eastern England, west of Hull. An attempt by the UK Environment Agency to manage flooding along the confluence of two rivers river saw about 440 hectares (1,000 acres) of agricultural land transformed into a flood storage area by intentionally removing part of an existing embankment in 2006.

The resulting floodplain, the Alkborough Flats, was one of the largest created in Europe at the time. It has reduced the risk of flooding by tidal estuary waters for about 600 properties and lessened the need for flood defenses upstream. The new wetland habitat has also attracted a variety of birds, insects, fish and vegetation. It’s far from unique: The approach has also been successfully introduced in places such as the Netherlands, India and Thailand.

Indonesia Mulls Moving Its Disappearing Capital City 
In what is one of the most extreme examples of managed retreat, Indonesia is planning to move its capital from the overcrowded, rapidly sinking metropolis of Jakarta to a new site about 2,000 kilometers (1,250 miles) away.

Parts of Jakarta, a coastal city home to more than 10 million people, are subsiding at a rate of up to 20 centimeters a year, caused in part by overextraction of groundwater; most of North Jakarta could be submerged by 2050 due to rising sea levels and regular flooding. But, even if the government finds a new home, the millions of Jakartans living in slums will most likely have to fend for themselves.

Martin Kuebler is a Canadian journalist working at DW.This article, which was edited by Tamsin Walker, is published courtesy of Deutsche Welle (DW).