"Studies of climate change and its impact on coastal communities usually focus on rising sea level. Now, scientists from MIT and Princeton University have developed a method to examine how multiple effects of climate change -- including the combination of sea-level rise and stronger hurricanes -- will affect storm surges that wash over sea walls and inundate communities, damaging buildings and infrastructure."

"As a demonstration of the new technique, the scientists quantified how hurricane storm surges would affect New York City. They found that coupled with climate change, there would be a dramatic increase in the annual risk of so-called “100-year events” that have a 1 percent risk of occurring in any given year. As the climate changes, such powerful storms would have a 5 to 33 percent chance of happening in a given year in Manhattan, the scientists reported in an analysis published online today in the journal Nature Climate Change."

Carolyn Y. Johnson reports for the Boston Globe February 15, 2012. [2]