当海水升高1英尺之后

People living near coasts will face new risks as they adapt to climate change and sea level rise. That’s according to Gary Yohe, an economist at Wesleyan University in Middletown, Connecticut.

来自康涅狄格州米德尔顿的卫斯理大学经济学家盖里.尤伊说，居住在海岸附近的人们为适应气候变化和海水上升将承受新的风险。

Gary Yohe: The bottom line for the economics of coastal adaptation, adaptation in general, is to think about managing risk.

盖里.尤伊：海岸适应性经济学的本质内容是研究风险管理。

One out of three people alive today live near a coast. And coasts, said Yohe, face increased risks from storms, combined with rising seas that could up to a foot or more by mid century. These are the risks caused by a world made warmer from burning fossil fuels, he said.

目前有三分之一的人口住在海岸附近。尤伊说，到本世纪中期海平面可能上升1英尺或更多，受到海水上升及暴风雨等的影响，海岸面临风险越来越大。这些风险产生的原因是：化石燃料的燃烧引发的全球变暖。

Gary Yohe: If the ocean is now a foot higher, the character of that storm changes dramatically as it hits land… The storm surge is probably at least a foot higher, but depending on the topography could be much higher.

盖里.尤伊：如果海平面现在上升一英尺，暴风雨侵袭海岸的方式会有很大的改变，巨浪可能会至少变高一英尺，受地形不同的影响，风浪可能会更高。

Economists, said Yohe, can quantify what it takes to protect people from storm damage made more intense by climate change.

气候变化使暴风雨的危害更猛烈，尤伊说经济学家可以定量算出保护人们免受危害所需的花销。

Gary Yohe: The economics of protection involve infrastructure, the cost of evacuation, the cost of disrupting the economy of the city, for a couple of days as they return from the storm.

盖里.尤伊：这些保护措施的经济成本包括基础设施，人员疏散的费用，以及风暴过后城市经济被扰乱带来的损失。

But Yohe said there’s more than just the economic cost of climate change.

但是尤伊说气候变化造成的损失的远非只有经济方面的。

Gary Yohe: Communities may be wiped out. The experience of Katrina is certainly an example. You wouldn’t want to calibrate all of the massive loss of life and lost culture in the forced migration that was incurred in things like that, back down to dollars and cents.

盖里.尤伊：社区可能被彻底摧毁。卡特里娜飓风就是典型的例子。风暴会导致生命大规模消亡及强迫迁移后的文化流失，你们可能不希望以钱来衡量这些损失。