Informing conservation planning using sea‐level rise and storm surge impact estimates in the Galveston Bay and Jefferson County, Texas area

摘要: Coastal communities across the Gulf of Mexico are increasingly vulnerable to coastal hazards including sea level rise (Weiss et al. 2011; Karl et al. 2009; IPCC 2007). The Gulf of Mexico contains 20,000 km² of land below 1.5 meters in elevation (Titus and Richman 2001) and is one of the most vulnerable regions to sea level rise (SLR) in the continental US (Weiss et al. 2011; Thieler and Hammar-Klose 1999). Local planners and property owners have generally not decided how they will act in response to SLR (Titus et al. 2009) nor have they developed future shoreline management strategies to address SLR (CCSP 2009).These increasing hazards threaten not only the human-built infrastructure and coastal communities, but also natural habitats and ecosystems. Wetlands are among the Gulf of Mexico’s most economically and ecologically important habitats and comprise thirty-one percent (28,372 mi²) of land within the US Gulf coastal watershed (NOAA 2006). These habitats provide many benefits for human and natural communities including storm surge protection, erosion prevention, pollutant removal and fish and wildlife habitat (NOAA 2011). An example of the economic importance of marsh systems can be illustrated in the annual commercial shellfish harvest within the Gulf’s coastal wetlands; for 2009 alone, the harvest value was $474 million (National Marine Fisheries Service 2010). The Gulf of Mexico’s wetlands have experienced significant declines in recent decades (NOAA 2011) and accelerated SLR projections are expected to further increase the rate and magnitude of wetland loss (Nicholls 2004). At current rates of loss, one-third of …