Assessing the Economic Costs of Sea Level Rise and Benefits of Coastal Protection: A Spatiotemporal Approach

Abstract

Sea level rise (SLR) is believed to be the most dangerous impact of climate change in coastal regions. Adapting to its impacts has become imperative since SLR is now considered inevitable. Lack of local economic analysis of SLR impacts is one of the major obstacles impeding adaptation. To address this gap, this study employs a spatiotemporal approach to estimate the economic costs of future SLR as well as the benefits of coastal protection, a principal adaptation strategy, under four local SLR projection scenarios in the mainland Miami-Dade County, Florida. Our findings indicate that SLR impacts are nonlinear and coastal protection, while costly, can significantly reduce future potential losses. A novel spatial fishnet approach is also proposed to help local decision makers identify areas that should be prioritized for protection. Findings of this study aim to support local adaptation planning, and call for integrating adaptation for SLR and its uncertainties into local planning frameworks to achieve long-term sustainability and well-being of our precious coastal communities.

A Holistic Framework for Evaluating Adaptation Approaches to Coastal Hazards and Sea Level Rise: A Case Study from Imperial Beach, California

“…To our knowledge, this was the first time that a replacement cost approach has been used to estimate the suite of ecosystem services of beaches into adaptation planning. Previous CBAs of sea level rise adaptation only estimates some of the ecological benefits of beaches, and therefore undervalues beaches in comparison to competing uses along the coast (e.g., armoring to protect inland and upland property) [8,[10][11][12][13][14]. As explained in more detail in King et al [47], this approach applies the same valuation metric-replacement cost-used to value human-made structures such as buildings and water pumps, as well as privately owned land.…”

“…Damage impacts to both private and public structures were estimated using standard U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (USACE) depth damage curves [10,12], which values damages as a percentage of the structures' replacement cost. Estimates of publicly owned structures and facilities were obtained from the City.…”

“…In particular, assigning monetary value to ecosystem services remains a challenge. Many of the methods used in this analysis are standard (or were standard at the time of the study) [10,12,35,62]. The analysis of flooding, erosion, and the recreational value of beaches is based on relatively standard methods.…”

“…A key part of adaptation planning and establishing local priorities should be a costbenefit analysis (CBA) of options. Most previous CBAs (e.g., [9][10][11][12][13][14]) of coastal adaptation focus on the non-market values of recreation and/or storm prevention. For example in a widely cited study, Liu et al [15] estimates the ecological benefits of beaches in New Jersey, but their "gap analysis" (p. 1276) notes the absence of studies looking at other ecological services provided by beaches other than recreation, "disturbance prevention", and "cultural and spiritual" values.…”

Protecting Coastlines from Flooding in a Changing Climate: A Preliminary Experimental Study to Investigate a Sustainable Approach

“…More frequently, high tides reach values that cause costal recession and high sediment transport deficit, and hence, it is necessary to protect these areas with various coastal structures to reduce or at least to mitigate coastal erosion problems. As a result, impacts of climatic variations are usually the greatest along the coast [12][13][14]. However, many of the current coastal protections (e.g., groins, seawalls, and emerged breakwaters) were built with the single purpose of protecting the coast, without environmental or economic concerns, maintenance costs, or the negative consequences that such structures could cause up to considerable distances along the coast.…”