Wednesday, November 4, 2009

South Florida's four counties have pledged to work together to adapt to threats posed by climate change.

"This is not just a feel-good thing," Monroe County Mayor George Neugent said. "One of the things that is a big for me is our responsibility for the future -- that we do our due diligence."

Neugent was one of several Keys public officials who attended a first-of-its-kind summit in Fort Lauderdale on Oct. 23, along with counterparts from Miami-Dade, Broward and Palm Beach counties.

South Florida, with its low-lying shorelines and reliance for drinking water on an underground aquifer that could be inundated with salt by rising seas, is at the nation's frontline when it comes to threats from global warming.

Some scientists predict that seas will rise by as much as three to five feet by 2100, and even conservative estimates place sea level rise at nearly a foot before the end of the century.

In Key West, sea level has already increased nearly 9 inches since 1913, according to National Weather Service data - transforming roads that were once safely elevated a foot above the mean high tide into ones that are flooded commonly.

At the intersection of North Roosevelt and First Street, for example, the road was a foot underwater during the most recent lunar high tide, said Annalise Mannix, the city's director of environmental programs. Add another foot to that and you have to raise the road or put in a pump station. Take into account all the other low-lying Key West roads, and you're talking about 20 pump stations costing a total of $20 to $40 million, Mannix said.

Such concerns are by no means isolated to Key West or the Keys. And it's such worries that helped prompt the regional conference, where one important goal was to develop a united front that could be presented to the federal government when the time comes for it to hand out grants.

"These are tight fiscal times," said Jim Murley, a Florida Atlantic University professor who chairs the state energy and climate commission. "I don't think any one of the counties can do this alone. There is a consensus that we need to work together to get funding."

But the cooperation isn't just about political might in Washington, D.C., Murley said. All of South Florida shares common problems, including potential threats to regional freshwater supplies.

"They are going to be working together on issues that cross boundaries, and frankly all of these issues do," he said.

At the conference's end, representatives of all four counties signed a compact pledging to develop a Southeast Regional Climate Change Action Plan and to convene again next October.

The plan will outline regional strategies for the reduction of greenhouse gas emissions through energy efficiency and increased reliance on public transit. It also will include adaptation strategies that would account for rising sea levels, salt water intrusion into the aquifers and for the possibility of amplified hurricane strength driven by warming seas.

Murley said that South Florida already has a good start on dealing with rising seas, since it has been incorporated into the ongoing development of $20 billion Comprehensive Everglades Restoration Plan.

"What we're going to do now is communicate the urban agenda a little better," he said.

Neugent, noting that efforts are already being made for South Florida officials to meet with policy makers in Washington, said he doesn't think the regional plan will be an example of lots of government talk and little action.

"I don't think that it's going to die on the vine," the mayor said.

rsilk@keysnews.com