Climate Report Details Flood Risk to Sites in Washington

WASHINGTON — The nation’s capital is likely to see record flooding by 2050, putting about $7 billion worth of property, three military bases and parts of the National Mall at risk as a result of climate change that is raising sea levels all over the world, according to a report released Tuesday by the research group Climate Central.

That is one of the group’s more conservative estimates in a report titled “Washington, D.C., and the Surging Sea.”

In the worst case, the group draws an end-of-the-century picture of the Lincoln and Jefferson memorials as islands in a flooded Potomac River, and Fort McNair, the Washington Navy Yard and parts of Joint Base Anacostia-Bolling completely under water.

Scientists’ warnings about the effects of climate change are not new, with predictions that melting polar ice will lead to a rise in sea levels that will lap around the edges of New York, turn Houston into a latter-day Venice and force millions of residents in low-lying nations like Bangladesh out of their homes.

Read the full New York Times article here.