New York City Gets Its Temperature Taken
EarthVision Environmental News
06/27/00
NEW YORK, NY, June 27, 2000 - Researchers gathering at Columbia University in New York City have announced the results of a two-year effort to assess the vulnerability of the city to climate change. The sectors addressed in this study are coasts, wetlands, infrastructure, water supply, public health, energy and institutional decision-making.
Drs. Cynthia Rosenzweig, Vivien Gornitz, Ellen Hartig, Richard Goldberg, and Reggie Blake of NASA's Goddard Institute of Space Studies, along with researchers from other institutions, present the results of the Metropolitan East Coast (MEC) at the university June 19th.
"Climate impacts in cities are multi-dimensional," said Rosenzweig, a Co-Leader of the MEC study. "Our goal is to provide critical information to assist the region's decision-makers to anticipate, prepare for and prevent the potentially serious impacts of climate events now and in the future."
According to a NASA news release on the study's findings, over the last 100 years the area temperature has risen two degrees Fahrenheit. Scenarios from global climate modeling studies project additional warming for the New York Metropolitan Region throughout the 21st century, ranging from four to10 degrees Fahrenheit.
The authors note that the effects of this warming trend will not be uniform across all sectors. The most direct health effect likely to be associated with a warming and more variable climate is an increase in summer-season heat stress, particularly among the poor and elderly. In addition, a warmer climate is also likely to raise the demand for electricity and cause increased stress to the electric utility systems.
Other study results say the sea level, which is already rising in the MEC region, is projected to rise 4.3 to11.7 inches over the next 20 years. The researchers foresee this sea-level rise would lead to more storm damage and increased beach erosion as well as impacting fish and bird habitats in the wetland areas the.
The goal of the study was to put these facts and figures in the hands of those people making decisions in the Metropolitan East Coast (MEC) area - one of 16 regional components that contribute to the US National Assessment: The Potential Consequences of Climate Variability and Change, organized by the US Global Change Research Program. The goal of each regional assessment is to understand the impacts of climate change and variability on physical systems and human activities of a specific area of the United States. The Metro East Coast Assessment is the Regional Assessment that specifically addresses issues of climate change and cities. The National Science Foundation and Columbia University's Earth Institute provided major funding for the study.
NASA notes the study area for the Metro East Coast Assessment covers the 31 counties of the New York City metropolitan region. The area consists of 13,000 square miles, with jurisdictions involving 1,600 cities, towns and villages in the three states of New York, New Jersey, and Connecticut. The total regional population is 19.6 million, of which 7.3 million live in New York City.
For more information about the MEC project is available at http://metroeast_climate.ciesin.columbia.edu. The GISS web site regarding their contribution to the National Assessment is: http://www.giss.nasa.gov/projects/metroeast/. The web site for public comment on the draft National Assessment report is: http://www.gcrio.org/NationalAssessment/.