By Kenneth Richard on 30. August 2021
A global-scale analysis of 221 islands in the tropical Pacific and Indian Oceans reveals “a predominantly stable or accretionary trend in the area of atoll islands worldwide” throughout the 21st century. The Maldives islands alone expanded by 37.5 km² from 2000 to 2017.
For over 3 decades we’ve been warned “entire nations could be wiped off the face of the Earth by rising sea levels if the global warming trend is not reversed.”
But reality keeps on undermining this catastrophist narrative.
A 2019 global-scale analysis of 709 islands in the Pacific and Indian Oceans revealed 89% were either stable or growing in size, and that no island larger than 10 ha (and only 1.2% of islands larger than 5 ha) had decreased in size since the 1980s (Duvat, 2019).
And now a new analysis of post-2000 trends also indicates global-scale stable to expanding shorelines for hundreds of Pacific and Indian Ocean islands, with over half of the net growth (39 km² of 62 km²) occurring from 2013 to 2017.
“Between the oldest (1999–2001 or 1999–2002) and most recent (2017) composite images, the land area on the 221 atolls examined increased by 61.74 km² from 1007.60 km² to 1069.35 km², a 6.1 % increase. Most of this increase, 38.89 km², occurred between 2013 and 2017. The global-scale change in atoll island landmass was largely a product of an increase of island area in the Maldives and South China Sea (SCS), which account for 54.05 km² (87.56 %) of the global increase in land area. Between 1999–2001 and 2017, the Maldives added 37.50 km² of land area, representing 60.74 % of the net global increase in atoll land area. Tokelau and Tuvalu, both small landmasses (9.65 km2 and 25.14 km²respectively), both increased by ∼7%, while the Marshalls, French Polynesia, Kiribati, Palau, Chagos and the Federated States of Micronesia all changed by less than 3%. At the national-scale French Polynesia and Palau were the only countries for which a net decrease in land area was observed (-1.46 km² or -0.48 % and -0.16 km² or -2.71 % respectively).”
Image Source: Holdaway et al., 2021
Two other separately-published studies by a team of scientists (Sengupta et al., 2021 and Sengupta et al., 2021) use aerial photographs dating to the 1940s (and 1960s and 1970s) of 104 and 71 reef islands in the equatorial Pacific (Micronesia, Gilbert Islands) to compare shoreline changes over time.
The scientists found there has been a net shoreline expansion of 3% and 2.45%, respectively, in the 104 and 71 islands analyzed in the last 50 to 75 years.
Once again, none of these studies support claims of catastrophic sea level rise engulfing island coasts as a consequence of global warming.
“This study presents an analysis of shoreline changes on 104 coral reef islands from 16 atolls in the western equatorial Pacific nation of the Federated States of Micronesia across a period coincident with rising local sea level and a high frequency of storm events. Aerial photographs from the mid-1940s and 1970s were analysed alongside recent high-resolution satellite imagery to document shoreline changes and planform morphological adjustments in islands. Results revealed accretion has been the predominant mode of shoreline change, with 46% of the studied shorelines showing statistically significant accretion leading to a net increase of 64.37 ha (~3%) of planform land area across the archipelago.”
Image Source: Sengupta et al., 2021
“Shoreline positions of 71 islands from 3 atolls and 4 mid-ocean reef platforms were analysed by comparing historical aerial photographs (from 1940s and 1960s) and recent satellite imagery covering a period of local sea-level rise rate of ~2.2 mm/year. Results show ~47% of the shorelines were characterised by statistically significant accretion leading to a net increase of 274.07 ha (2.45%) of planform land area.”
Earth is so ‘burning hot’ that Pacific and Indian Ocean are evaporating, sea level is going down.
Given the nature of atolls, if the coral grows faster than the sea level rise, the island will grow.
Well, waddaya know… The Maldives are making new beach front property!
This is a incredibly sad; the complete inability to understand that coral atolls are biological structures created by marine organisms and as a consequence atolls naturally grow larger when conditions are favourable to the corals, such as the increase in accommodation space for these organisms as sea level rises.
“Ocean islands shorlines are expanding and will take over surrounding countries within 20 years…because of global warming” …new alarmist headlines.
How long before the CNN reporters mention this? balanced reporting? No? Gotta love these Reality Checks.
Although hurricanes are widely advertised with good reason for their erosion, hurricane Andrew was estimated to put enough sediment in Louisiana marshes to last an estimated 35-50 years. This was just east of the rapidly encroaching Atchafalaya delta and they did this without parrotfish. Nyman, J. A., et al. 1995. Roles and patterns of hurricane sedimentation in an estuarine marsh landscape. Estuarine Coastal Shelf Science.. 40(6):665-679. https://doi.org/10.1006/ecss.1995.0045
Now we have this to worry about. I hope they don’t get so big that they capsize.
So is the Western side of the Pacific Plate rising upward ?
(Are we nearing the creation of a new moon ?)
Could this explain all those airfields, hotels, marinas etc in the sinking Maldives?
Can we get a refund?
The new island land is THINNER than the old land. (LOL)
Quote from the Holdaway et al paper:
Highlights
Before we all get tooooo carried away and make Complete Tits of ourselves, notice Point #4 in the above quote
I remember BBC Shukman’s many-layered lying when Trump pulled the American taxpayer out of the Paris Agreement. One of the lies was that Trump would drown Pacific islands. And aaargh not again Miami streets.
Bleaching extinction non-event.
But but, in 2009, President Mohammed Nasheed and 13 government officials of the Maldives held an underwater cabinet meeting, to illustrate how dire things were, and that soon the island would be gone. So what do these scientists know?
Well, we do know that South China Sea islands are growing because of ChiCom construction of military bases.
So the residents of the Maldives and Tuvalu are dredging up sand from the ocean bottom to build safer, wider beaches. They’re adapting to the situation, similar to what the Dutch did in the 17th and 18th centuries with their dikes. And if what they built is overtopped in the 2090’s, they have 70 years to come up with another adaptation.
This reminds me of a totally natural phenomenon in a bay near the mouth of the Loire River in western France. From the north bank of the river, the coastline extends west (with south-facing beaches), which are popular tourist destinations (such as La Baule) with expensive hotels and casinos. From the south bank of the river, the coastline extends south, with west-facing beaches in Saint-Brevin and Tharon, where houses and rents are relatively cheap.
Some years ago, owners of beachfront property in La Baule were complaining that sand was eroding from their beaches, and the beaches were becoming more rocky and less pleasant to walk on barefoot. However, soft sand was accumulating on west-facing Tharon Plage, at the rate of about 5 cm per year of new sand depth, as measured relative to a fixed concrete wall.
Since the La Baule community had much more money than Tharon, they commissioned hundreds of dump trucks to transport sand from sand-rich (but financially poorer) Tharon and dump it on the gravelly beaches of La Baule so the tourists would come back. But with the strong prevailing westerlies over the bay, that sand will probably be back in Tharon in another few years…
For small amount of money from the government, I volunteer to sit on the beach at the Maldives and observe the waves and the tides, walk the beach daily, and keep a close eye on the coral. If I happen to see anything alarming, I will let Willis know immediately!
Oh Daddy, I WANT my own island, why can’t I have one?
Where else can I put my pony?
I love my pony.
Thank you Daddy.
Further supporting the fact that technically there is no global sea level rise. Most beaches are prograding and some are regressing, that means global sea level is at stillstand.
I want to know more about the horizontal stabilizer on the tail of the plane in the picture
Gosh – Under Climate Change children of the future may not know what the Pacific Ocean is!!!
(end snark)
Coral isn’t well known for growing above water.
It takes an incredible amount of people and pebble throwing to increase island shorelines along much of their islands.
This situation brings up the dreaded, by alarmists and other charlatans, SLD; i.e. Sea Level Decline.
You gotta love science! It keeps throwing reality in your face and destroying your meta narrative! Haha, epic stuff! I love seeing meta narrative on the ropes!
Considering that Coral is comprised of Calcium Carbonate, and that there is abundant Calcium in the Oceans and that a CO2 is slightly soluble in water, one could hypothesize that higher CO2 levels in the atmosphere would lead to greater rates of Coral growth and hence, growth of Coral Atolls.