In the NewsSan Francisco Public PressMarch 19, 2018

State Looking to Require Cities to Plan for Rising Seas

California officials are taking their first, tentative steps toward requiring cities to plan for severe sea level rise that scientists now say could conceivably elevate high tides by up to 22 feet by the middle of the next century. Such a deluge would overtake much of San Francisco’s southeastern waterfront, submerge huge swaths of West Oakland and Alameda, and inundate large portions of cities along the Peninsula and in the South Bay. However, even the state's freshest predictions of sea-level rise seem to be superseded by more recent science. In December, Robert Kopp, a Rutgers University researcher, Imapact Lab co-director, and member of the governor’s working group, published an updated prediction that if global carbon emissions from industry remain high, sea level rise could pose a runaway risk by the end of the century.