The Water Will Come

June 15, 2017

Rolling Stone contributing editor Goodell (How To Cool the Planet) looks at sea-level rise caused by Earth's melting ice caps and its effects on coastal settlements. He visited shrinking Greenland and the shores of Alaska, New York City, Virginia, Venice Beach, the Netherlands, the Marshall Islands, and Nigeria, concluding that the inexorable rise is a "slow-motion catastrophe" for low-lying cities and for ports. Some elaborate engineering works are being built to counter higher tides and storm surges for the next few decades. However, most of the present seacoast infrastructure will have to be abandoned eventually. Goodell spent quite a bit of time in Miami Beach, FL, where king tides regularly flood sewers and streets. He interviewed developers and politicians who understand but refuse to discuss the issue. The author offers sensible suggestions for dealing with this difficult situation, but will anyone act on them? Delay will foreclose the option of a managed retreat from the water's edge. VERDICT Anyone worried about the planet should check this one out, and coastal residents in particular should read this and consider their options.--David R. Conn, formerly with Surrey Libs., BC

Copyright 2017 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

September 4, 2017
Not long after Hurricane Sandy hit New York City in 2012, environmental reporter Goodell (How to Cool the Planet) was in Manhattan’s Lower East Side, where he “saw broken trees, abandoned cars, debris scattered everywhere,” and he began to realize how poorly prepared cities were to handle rising ocean levels. In this earnest volume, Goodell looks at the rise in sea levels around the globe, refuting climate-change deniers who fail to accept scientific facts. He takes readers to such places as Miami Beach, Fla., and Venice, Italy, which are regularly threatened by floods. The former thrives on tourism and real estate development, but there is little public regard for conservation; South Florida is “a world created by dredgers, cooled by air-conditioning, powered by nuclear energy, dominated by cars, sanitized by insecticides.” When Goodell travels to Venice, famous for its series of canals, he finds residents already acquiesced to ever-deepening pools of water around the sinking city. Discussing Barack Obama’s 2015 visit to the Arctic, Goodell recalls conversations he had with the then president months before international climate talks in Paris that year. Obama understood how important it was to fight climate change but advocated pragmatism. Perusing Goodell’s alarming examination, readers may question the wisdom of such an approach. Agent: Heather Schroder, Compass Talent.

Starred review from October 15, 2017
Climate change has many, interconnected aspects, none more urgent than those affecting the oceans. In this engaging book, environmental writer Goodell (How to Cool the Planet, 2011) points out that while sea levels have always risen and fallen, the current rise is driven primarily by the dramatically accelerating melting of the arctic ice caps, and with so many cities on seashores, this will be devastating. Goodell circles the globe, interviewing scientists and those responsible for keeping people and their homes above water, observing that how cities and nations, many already dealing with more frequent flooding and seawater contamination of freshwater sources, are able to adapt varies widely because of differing economic and political conditions. For some, it will mean building vast seawalls to shore up existing development, for others it will mean elevating infrastructure or abandoning low-lying regions and islands within a few generations. Creative responses must be deployed to save millions of lives and coastal communities, while nations must also work together to mitigate the impact we're having on the earth's delicate ecological balance. Goodell points to the Paris Climate Accord, which acknowledges human activity as a source of global warming and seeks a collective reduction in greenhouse gases to slow down global warming, as an essential first step.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2017, American Library Association.)

Starred review from October 1, 2017
How the impending rise in sea levels caused by increasing amounts of carbon dioxide in the air will make life on the edge of the ocean very different over the next century.In this gripping book, Rolling Stone contributing editor Goodell (How to Cool the Planet: Geoengineering and the Audacious Quest to Fix Earth's Climate, 2010, etc.) argues that "sea level rise is one of the central facts of our time, as real as gravity." He looks back over the history of human reaction to changing sea levels, particularly during the period 15 millennia ago when the last ice age ended; then, ocean levels were rising 13 feet per century, and people were forced to relocate inland every few years. Now, of course, it's not so simple. As the author points out, "there's a terrible irony in the fact that it's the very infrastructure of the Fossil Fuel Age--the housing developments on the coast, the roads, the railroads, the tunnels, the airports--that make us most vulnerable." Goodell concentrates most of his attention on the East Coast of the United States. He examines how the foundation of Miami Beach, built from scratch as a tourist destination, makes it particularly subject to destruction. He scrutinizes the Navy base at Norfolk and the efforts of those in charge of maintaining it to prepare for the future in a "climate denial hotspot." The author also traveled around the world to explore the possibly futile efforts to preserve Venice from rising water and to see what is occurring in the Marshall Islands, whose future as a nation looks insecure. While Goodell occasionally seems to be leaning heavily on those areas where assignments have sent him, overall, this is a well-rounded, persuasive survey. Notes of hope about the possibilities afforded by human flexibility and ingenuity occasionally lighten some of the grimness.A frightening, scientifically grounded, and starkly relevant look at how climate change will affect coastal cities.

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