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Gavin Newsom Talks Climate With Quebec’s Premier As State Braces For Rising Seas

/in , /by /Cal Mattersby Judy Lin

Quebec Premier François Legault will be hosted by Gov. Gavin Newsom in Sacramento to discuss reducing greenhouse gases. Today’s closed-door meeting comes as the Trump administration accuses California of overstepping its bounds by entering into an international emissions agreement. Remind me: California’s cap-and-trade program has been around since 2013 and aims to limit the state’s greenhouse gas emissions. Industries meet their goals by lowering emissions or buying state-auctioned permits that allow them to pollute. The permits can be bought and sold.

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California Must Act Now To Prepare For Sea Level Rise, State Lawmakers Say

/in , , /by /Los Angeles Times by Rosanna Xia

The camera zooms in on the majestic sandy bluffs that make this stretch of the San Diego County coast so iconic: a close-up, everyone realizes, of that cliff crumbling in real time — ancient sand and soft, somewhat cemented rocks tumbling onto the beach below.

Moments later, a popular commuter rail rumbles by. Some in the room gasped. Lawmakers watched in sober silence.

“This is a natural phenomenon; it’s feeding the beaches, but it’s happening more and more frequently in part because of sea level rise,” said Merrifield, director of Scripps’ Center for Climate Change Impacts and Adaptation. “So what can do? That’s why we’re here, right?”

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California Gets Good Marks Planning for Sea-Level Rise

/in , /by /KPBS (San Diego, Calif.)by Erik Anderson

California got an A-grade for its efforts to protect the state’s beaches in the latest coastal survey from the California-based Surfrider group.

The survey looked at how states with coastlines managed sediment, coastal development, coastal armoring, and sea-level rise.

The state’s proactive coastal policies earned a high rating.

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Surfrider Study Calls For Allowing The Ocean To Advance Inland

/in , /by /The Orange County Register by Martin Wisckol

While California scored the only “A” in a new environmental assessment of the nation’s beaches, the state’s sole shortcoming in the report pulls back the curtain on a growing conflict over whether beachfront homeowners should be allowed to protect their property against rising seas.

Some argue that protecting coastal homes, roads and train tracks with boulders and other types of seawalls is the most practical way to deal with sea-level rise. But the Surfrider Foundation, which issued the new report, is among those who believe that approach should be avoided. It says the result is the elimination of beaches as the ocean washes away sand and waves pound directly onto the armoring.

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