The beaches in Southern California continue to erode and rising sea levels could be the main reason behind the shoreline’s depletion.
A new study says that the iconic shoreline, which spreads from Santa Barbara to San Diego, is under threat from being completely worn out towards the end of the 21st century.
The study predicts that many Southern Californian beaches and cliffs would be eroded by the end of this century. The scientists made use of computer dubbed CoSMoS-COAST to make such predictions.
How will California suffer from this erosion?
The main concern of the researchers is the expected rise in sea levels. Two- years back, the study led by NASA predicted that the Earth’s sea level would increase at an alarming rate.
“The potency of losing so many of our beaches in Southern California to sea level increase is honestly unsatisfactory. The beaches are similar to our public parks and economic heart and soul of our coastal communities,” states John Ainsworth, the state Coastal Commission Executive Director, in a message to the American Geophysical Union.
Beaches and shores are similar to the first line of defense against hurricanes and coastal storms. Scientists say that if proper action is not taken to combat erosion, flooding of coastal areas like Venice in Los Angeles, will soon become very common.
Losing the beaches will not just affect the tourism industry but also the expose homes, businesses and the infrastructure to the critical level.
What is the potential way to overcome this?
One of the measures to overcome this scenario is to renovate the Southern California beaches with more sand. Nevertheless, this is a temporary solution and is currently being deployed by the government. Levees, sea walls and other beach-conserving equipment may potentially work toward tackling erosion.
One more option is to shift all the residences and businesses to inland place. But, this solution is not practical. Hence, scientists force environmentalists and people to suggest new conversation methods address the problem.
The complete study has been published in the Journal of Geophysical Research: Earth Surface.