
Planning to sink: What happens if Kiribati drowns? - rosser
http://www.pbs.org/newshour/updates/planning-sink-happens-kiribati-drowns/?utm_source=facebook&utm_medium=pbsofficial&utm_campaign=newshour
======
gambiting
"“If you have everything but land – if you have a population that is displaced
– whether that allows you to be a state is a novel question,”"

Well, I can think of our own example - Poland has been forcibly taken and
split into three parts during late 18th century, by Russia, Prussia(Germany)
and Austria. For nearly 20 years there was no such country as Poland on the
map, and people who lived on the lands of former Poland were forbidden from
even speaking Polish.

Yet the entire country has survived - we had a government and an army which
both operated from other countries, until finally we were given little
independence back in 1807 - but even after that Russia has controlled majority
of the land here. Fast forward 200 years - Poland is a large country in the
centre of Europe, despite having disappeared from every map for more than two
decades at one point.

So based on that I would say that yes, there can be a nation without land.

~~~
lmm
> For nearly 20 years there was no such country as Poland on the map, and
> people who lived on the lands of former Poland were forbidden from even
> speaking Polish.

Sounds like Poland didn't exist at that time then, if there weren't even
people speaking the language.

To my mind a more relevant example would be various governments-in-exile.
Wasn't there a case during WWII where a Canadian(?) hospital was redesignated
as the territory as one of the occupied countries, so that a princess(?) born
there could be legally born on native soil?

~~~
gambiting
>>Sounds like Poland didn't exist at that time then, if there weren't even
people speaking the language.

Of course there were, they just had to do it at home, in secret. My point is,
that the entire nation survived even though for two decades they couldn't even
identify as Polish in public.

And yes, we also had a government in exile during that time. Heck, we also had
a government in exile during communist rule in Poland(1945-1989), which based
its operations in London.

~~~
lmm
> My point is, that the entire nation survived even though for two decades
> they couldn't even identify as Polish in public.

How do you distinguish between a nation surviving, and a new nation being
founded with the same name?

~~~
gambiting
Well it's not like the Russians or the Prussians suddenly decided they wanted
to start Poland again - it must have been Polish people who wanted that, so I
think it's quite clear it was Polish people "surviving" long enough to see
their country come back. I think new nation would apply if the people starting
it had nothing to do with the original citizens? Like if someone wanted to
create a country of Sparta now - it's not Spartans surviving, it's just a new
country with an old name.

~~~
GFischer
Your Sparta analogy has a real-world example in Macedonia:

[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Republic_of_Macedonia](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Republic_of_Macedonia)

[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Macedonia_naming_dispute](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Macedonia_naming_dispute)

"Citing historical and territorial concerns resulting from the ambiguity
between the Republic of Macedonia, the adjacent Greek region of Macedonia and
the ancient Greek kingdom of Macedon which falls mostly within Greek
Macedonia, Greece opposes the use of the name "Macedonia" by the Republic of
Macedonia without a geographical qualifier, supporting a compound name such as
"Northern Macedonia" for use by all and for all purposes"

"..millions of ethnic Greeks identify themselves as Macedonians, unrelated to
the Slavic people who are associated with the Republic of Macedonia, Greece
further objects to the use of the term "Macedonian" for the neighboring
country's largest ethnic group and its language. The Republic of Macedonia is
accused of appropriating symbols and figures that are historically considered
part of Greek culture such as the Vergina Sun and Alexander the Great"

~~~
jessaustin
It's not clear that modern-day Greeks themselves are _closely_ related to
ancient Macedonians. Certainly some of today's Greeks are descended from the
Greeks of that time, but they're descended from a hundred other peoples who at
that time lived in a hundred other places as well. Just like those who live in
Macedonia today. Just like people all over the Earth who have some
Mediterranean heritage. (We can probably exclude the Inuits, Pygmies,
Aborigines, etc.)

Your great-grandfather might not remember migrating from a thousand miles
away, but that doesn't mean it didn't happen fifteen generations back.

------
ghostDancer
The Order of Malta has no territories except some buildings and no "real"
citizens and is semi recognized like a country, more by tradition than other
things, with a big difference that Kiribati has citizens that should be
relocated. The loss of their territories is a not so natural disaster. I think
is more a matter of international willing, if they will to recognize it and
maintain the status of Kiribati.

~~~
riffraff
how is the order of malta "semi recognized like a country" ?

~~~
LordIllidan
It retained its sovereignty.

Quoting from Wikipedia:
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sovereign_Military_Order_of_Mal...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sovereign_Military_Order_of_Malta)

Although this state came to an end with the ejection of the Order from Malta
by Napoleon Bonaparte, the Order as such survived. It retains its claims of
sovereignty under international law and has been granted permanent observer
status at the United Nations.

------
gd1
Meanwhile, in reality:

[http://www.abc.net.au/news/2010-06-03/pacific-islands-
growin...](http://www.abc.net.au/news/2010-06-03/pacific-islands-growing-not-
sinking/851738)

"Climate scientists have expressed surprise at findings that many low-lying
Pacific islands are growing, not sinking.

Islands in Tuvalu, Kiribati and the Federated States of Micronesia are among
those which have grown, largely due to coral debris, land reclamation and
sediment.

The findings, published in the magazine New Scientist, were gathered by
comparing changes to 27 Pacific islands over the last 20 to 60 years using
historical aerial photos and satellite images."

~~~
josho
Wow, that is incredibly selective quoting! From the same article "Sea levels
are obviously rising...the key problem is that sea level rise is likely to
accelerate".

The article describes that in the short term, bigger waves are leaving more
sediment expanding the island's area—but, the islands are not raising up, so
sea level rise will (and already has) displaced people from these islands.

My mother has been to Kiribati, she saw first hand portions that have been
lost to the sea. The reality is clear if you simply open your eyes and look.

~~~
dalke
The actual paper is, I believe,
[http://www.pacificdisaster.net/pdnadmin/data/original/SOPAC_...](http://www.pacificdisaster.net/pdnadmin/data/original/SOPAC_2010_The_dynamic_response.pdf)
. It comments "Results presented in this study show that the entire footprint
of islands are able to change so that erosion at the local scale (on one
aspect of an island) may be offset by accretion on other parts of the
coastline."

If correct, then it means seeing "portions that have been lost to the sea" is
an incomplete observation, without seeing which parts have been gained. The
paper's figure 6 shows some of changes over the decades, both loss and gain.

As a further complication, some of the increase in land area seems to be
human-controlled. In any case, one of the points of the paper is that the
Bruun Rule, "commonly advocated as an appropriate tool to assess coastal
change", is "ultimately misleading" because it doesn't explain the observed
changes.

The paper also agrees that sea levels are rising, at about 2mm/year.

But "in reality" \- quoting gd1 - the point isn't simply one of land area
growing or decreasing. It's that changes in sea level cause complicated
changes in the islands, because they are actually part of a complicated
dynamic system. I'll quote from the end of the paper:

> Given this positive trend, reef islands may not disappear from atoll rims
> and other coral reefs in the near-future as speculated. However, islands
> will undergo continued geomorphic change. Based on the evidence presented in
> this study it can be expected that the pace of geomorphic change may
> increase with future accelerated sea level rise. Results do not suggest that
> erosion will not occur. Indeed, as found in 15% of the islands in this
> study, erosion may occur on some islands. Rather, island erosion should be
> considered as one of a spectrum of geomorphic changes that have been
> highlighted in this study and which also include: lagoon shoreline
> progradation; island migration on reef platforms; island expansion and
> island extension. The specific mode and magnitude of geomorphic change is
> likely to vary between islands. Therefore, island nations must better
> understand the pace and diversity of island morphological changes and
> consider the implications of island persistence and morphodynamics for
> future adaptation.

------
Evgeny
Related:

Paradise almost lost: Maldives seek to buy a new homeland

[http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2008/nov/10/maldives-...](http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2008/nov/10/maldives-
climate-change)

And a longer story on Kiribati

Drowning Kiribati

[http://www.businessweek.com/printer/articles/169064-drowning...](http://www.businessweek.com/printer/articles/169064-drowning-
kiribati)

------
iwwr
What's preventing people from moving onto stilt houses or even large floating
seasteads? The big asset of Kiribati is their extensive EEZ which guarantees
income from fishing or other activities (mining, drilling etc). You can chain
together steel and concrete pontoons, add soil on top all without terrafirma.
That could even be funded by the industrialized nations that are supposedly
responsible for the sea level rise (a tiny cost, compared to actually cutting
emissions).

~~~
dalke
I can think of a few likely problems. The lack of surface area would make it
harder to get fresh water; something that's already difficult. One of the main
exports is copra, but I doubt that growing coconut trees on a platform will be
economically worthwhile. The same holds for other agriculture currently on the
island. (Sea level rise would also affect aquaculture in the lagoons, but I
can't guess if it would be better or worse.) I expect it will be extremely
expensive to raise the two international airports and over a dozen domestic
ones.

Assuming intense agriculture at 0.25 acres per person (that's 8x the current
population density) implies 100 sq. km of platform area. I see that sea docks
cost around $30/sq. foot. That's just a bare dock, without soil, so let's say
$50/sq. ft. "furnished" and at wholesale pricing. (I suspect I'm far under the
actual price.)

That's roughly $50 billion, or almost 20x the country's GDP.

On top of that, add maintenance costs. I can't begin to estimate that.

~~~
iwwr
How much would that be if it's a concrete platform with polystyrene on the
inside for buoyancy?

~~~
dalke
And able to stand up to the occasional typhoon? I have no idea. The point of
my exercise was to establish a minimum cost, to show why the idea isn't
economically practical.

Japan's Mega-float cost $150 million in 1999 for 1km x 60 meters. It was
designed as a floating airport for use in a protected bay. The floating
airport proposal ("Floatport") for San Diego was estimated at $10-$30 billion.
Both show that my $50 billion estimate is very low.

Then again, you don't actually need floating structures. As an alternative
estimate, a cubic meter of soil is about $35. The cost of 1 meter of soil
spread across 100 sq. km is $3.5 billion, plus shipping.

I see no way to get lower than that number. I see many way to get a lot
higher.

------
knz42
"“If you have everything but land – if you have a population that is displaced
– whether that allows you to be a state is a novel question,”"

Jews would have disagreed that this is a novel question -- for them the
question has been about for around 2000 years if not more.

~~~
madaxe_again
No, it IS a novel question, and it has yet to be answered. You talk as though
Israel is a done deal, when the ongoing situation suggests anything but.

Why do you need to do political astro-turfing for Israel on a totally
unrelated thread?

~~~
gadders
I wouldn't call it astro-turfing. For a long time, Israel was a race/people
without a homeland. You could maybe say the Palestinians are in that state now
as well.

~~~
67726e
I sure as shit would call it that.

