Demographics and risk of isolation due to sea level rise in the United States

Authors

Kelsea Best
Qian He, Rowan UniversityFollow
Allison C. Reilly
Deb A. Niemeier
Mitchell Anderson
Tom Logan

Document Type

Article

Version Deposited

Published Version

Publication Date

11-30-2023

Publication Title

Nature Communications

DOI

10.1038/s41467-023-43835-6

Abstract

Within coastal communities, sea level rise (SLR) will result in widespread intermittent flooding and long-term inundation. Inundation effects will be evident, but isolation that arises from the loss of accessibility to critical services due to inundation of transportation networks may be less obvious. We examine who is most at risk of isolation due to SLR, which can inform community adaptation plans and help ensure that existing social vulnerabilities are not exacerbated. Combining socio-demographic data with an isolation metric, we identify social and economic disparities in risk of isolation under different SLR scenarios (1-10 ft) for the coastal U.S. We show that Black and Hispanic populations face a disproportionate risk of isolation at intermediate levels of SLR (4 ft and greater). Further, census tracts with higher rates of renters and older adults consistently face higher risk of isolation. These insights point to significant inequity in the burdens associated with SLR. © 2023, The Author(s).

Comments

© The Author(s) 2023, corrected publication 2023. In this article the affiliation ‘Department of Geography, Planning, and Sustainability, Rowan University, Glassboro, NJ, USA’ was incorrectly assigned to Kelsea Best. The original article has been corrected.

Recommended Citation

Best, K., He, Q., Reilly, A.C. et al. Demographics and risk of isolation due to sea level rise in the United States. Nature Communications 14, 7904 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-023-43835-6

Creative Commons License

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.