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Outside In | Rising sea levels could sink Hong Kong, yet we are still doing very little about it
- New reports warn that a 2-3-metre rise would wreak havoc, affecting over a quarter of the population
- As New York, Singapore and other vulnerable cities plan for such an eventuality, our government seems less concerned. It’s time to align with national plans and boost coastal defences
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Our brush this week with Typhoon Ma-On – damp squib that it was – should remind us of a dangerously neglected reality: Hong Kong is among the world’s most vulnerable cities to climate change and rising sea levels – and we are not prepared.
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How timely, then, that local climate action group China Water Risk should release a flurry of papers this week on the threat we face from rising seas, and our government’s seeming unconcern about it. They call on Chief Executive John Lee Ka-chiu to create a task force to defend Hong Kong’s coastlines, and to invest in “low regret adaptation” that can protect us against potentially catastrophic inundation.
“It’s adapt or die,” they warn. “Unlike the heat, there is nowhere to hide from rising seas.”
The group contrasts Hong Kong’s policy inertia with detailed action plans in places like Singapore – which has budgeted around US$72 billion to reclaim islands, build barrages and create a new reservoir – and New York, which is taking action after it saw 90,000 homes inundated and 2 million people without power during Hurricane Sandy in 2012.
While Hong Kong is at present planning for a 0.23-metre rise in sea levels by 2050 and 0.49m by 2100, both Singapore and New York – and a host of other vulnerable cities – have a working assumption that sea levels could rise by 2-3 metres – and even higher during typhoons or hurricanes. The storm tides caused by Typhoon Mangkhut in 2018 lifted sea levels in parts of Hong Kong by between 3.88m and 4.71m, and resulted in economic losses of US$593 million.
China Water Risk’s research suggests that a 2-3 metre rise in sea levels around Hong Kong would affect over 40,000 residential buildings (of which 60 per cent are in the western New Territories), 3,000 commercial buildings (mainly on Hong Kong Island and in Kowloon) and almost 2,000 industrial buildings.
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