On Sept. 22, 1989, Hurricane Hugo made landfall in South Carolina. It had recently been downgraded to a Category 4 hurricane with sustained winds of 140 mph. The storm surge pounded the coast, with water levels reaching over 20 feet along parts of the coast. This hurricane was estimated to cause over $7 billion in damage — equivalent to about $18 billion in 2025 — along its path.
In a March print edition of The Daily Gamecock, the University of South Carolina's student-run publication, an opinion piece written by Samuel Cancilla, its opinion editor, discusses the damage being caused to coastal properties due to increased flooding, hurricanes and erosion. It also explains how The Nature Conservancy and the South Carolina Office of Resilience are working on shoreline and wetland restoration projects with the main goal of preventing flooding and reversing damage done by development.
With the increased risk of property damage caused by these events, most homeowners’ insurance rates for flooding have risen substantially over the past decade or have even been cancelled.
Cancilla goes on to state, “There is a crisis on our coast — one that is slowly and silently growing and can only be stopped by meaningful long-term action from both citizens and politicians ... We act now, petition lawmakers to revise and adapt our policies to combat the rising oceans, saving South Carolina’s coastlines for future generations. Or, we choose to keep our current ways and attempt to fight a losing battle against mother nature and her rising seas.”
The rising sea level and hurricanes are undeniably a serious issue. When such major events occur, this usually results in many casualties and deaths along with a tremendous loss of property.
In response Cancilla’s piece, I want to discuss several issues. The first has to do with the protection of properties along the coast of South Carolina. If one went back and researched news reports shortly after Hurricane Hugo, one would find that there was a lot of discussion about the property damage caused by these large hurricanes, especially in coastal areas.
It is strongly suggested in many reports that future developments along the coast should be limited and highly restricted due to the inevitable damage that was going to be caused by future hurricanes and flooding. Many political leaders in South Carolina argued that no additional construction should be allowed in low-lying coastal areas for the reasons stated. So, what occurred?
After a brief moratorium of a few years, much construction continued in these areas along the coast, essentially ignoring the warnings expressed by many. Now we are being asked to help with improvements to help protect these properties along the coast. Many of which were constructed after Hurricane Hugo, fully knowing what the owners could expect in future years, and now the homeowners and our state leaders will be asking those throughout the state to participate in spending their hard-earned money to project these properties from future flooding. This is incredibly irresponsible. What have people living along the coast expected? Why are they now going to be asking for a bailout?
However, I am going to focus on the crux of the article, which is the issue of ongoing issue of climate change — that is, global warming. The author states that the United States is historically the largest emitter of greenhouse gases and therefore should lead the world in fixing the climate crisis. Furthermore, he adds that the Trump administration has shown that it has no intention of stepping up to fix the climate crisis or even trying with the recent withdrawal from the Paris Agreement in 2025 and the restrictions on the Environmental Protection Agency.
So, what does Cancilla suggest be done other than that the U.S. should fix the problem? That really is the issue that needs to be addressed. While many people agree that climate change is an issue and greenhouse gas emissions impact our environment, not everyone agrees to the extent of the impact or how to go about solving the issue. This is the main issue with Cancilla’s column and many others. They fail to propose practical solutions to the problem we are now facing with increasing ocean levels.
Since I am criticizing this and other authors for not listing their suggestions to reduce greenhouse emissions, I feel compelled to identify some of those measures I have heard others mention. Understand that each of these would take far more discussion than I am qualified to do, and my only intent here is to identify some suggested changes in no particular order.
We need to focus on eliminating gas and coal fired power plants through the construction of a very large number of nuclear power plants. While some have mentioned the option of renewable energy, which is growing rapidly, they are mostly variable and would struggle to support the power grid on their own. So, nuclear is the most ideal solution. About 75 nuclear power plants are currently under construction, and more than 120 reactors are planned around the world.
Until recently, there was no discussion about building these power plants in the U.S. One problem that the U.S. has faced and has not been able to resolve is the fact that it has thousands of tons of nuclear waste spread throughout the country, yet has no comprehensive plan on what to do with nuclear waste. The other issue to factor in here is that well-respected analysts have documented research showing that the world has about 50 years left of oil and gas. Within a few decades, there may not be much of a choice as to where our power comes from. Should we not be planning ahead?
On top of changing our power source, we should eliminate gas vehicles. We see this already taking place where almost a dozen states have proposed eliminating the sale of gasoline powered vehicles in the next 10 or 15 years.
Similarly, we have seen an increase in some types of legislation that would no longer allow gas heating for homes. The timeframe varies, and many cities are taking their own approach, with the Department of Energy requiring new construction of federal buildings to limit on site fossil fuel consumption. What's currently being discussed is the next few decades, but this action could be coming to even more states in the near future.
Lastly, we should increase the tiered pricing of electricity based on consumption. This way, homebuilders and homeowners would look into more energy-efficient options. For example, an electrical charge of $0.15/kWh would be applied to a home consuming less than 1500 kWh/mo. For large and inefficient homes, the electric rate over a certain consumption would rise significantly. For example, the homeowner would be charged $0.15/kWh for the first 1500 kWh, $0.20/kWh for the next 500 kWh, $0.25/kWh for the next 500 kWh, etc.
My point is that we have to be looking at viable solutions for not only the U.S. but also setting an example for the rest of the world. We need to be looking long-term and come up with a comprehensive plan, knowing this could be very painful initially. Of course, with the development of nuclear power plants comes concerns such as we are currently facing in the Middle East. There might be other energy options for us to consider, but we need to be making long-term decisions and not put this off for another decade or two, as our slow actions up to this point seem to indicate.