reductions in emissions which will, we hope and trust, help to avert some of the worst impacts of climate change in the future. but the fact is that climate change is not only real, it is in fact happening and so we are dealing with it right now. the three speakers that are on my panel are all people who are coping in various ways and helping to be part of the solution. i'm going to just briefly introduce all three of them in order you have their biographies in your booklets so i won't read them to you. i will simply point out if you can't read the name tags that to the left of where i'm sitting on the panel or to your right is will travis, executive director of san francisco bay conservation and development commission, well known around him. i'm one of the people who pretend to be his boss over the years. to his left is david baumforth, senior principle with mwh, montgomery watson hargrove, a major international consulting firm. he's with their offices outside of london and they on do work for us as well. the last speaker is tom franza with san francisco puc. we will have some questions among the panelists and a little bit of discussion, but our goal is to leave a minimum of half an hour for interaction with the audience so we will try to get on with it briskly here, starting with will. . >> thanks so much, mary. first off, what i would like to do is acknowledge somewhere out in the audience is leslie lako of our staff. leslie, can you stand up? there she is. leslie lako is the creator and manager of the project that we have at bcdc to deal with climate change and sea level rise. as usually is the case, she does all the work and so of course i get invited to speak. i want to make it clear that any errors, omissions, oversight or inappropriate comments are my responsibility. any facts, solid analysis and clear logic belong to leslie. leon canetto likes to tell the story about the learned professor and scientist who is on the rubber chicken circuit making speeches about a particular subject and the university provides a driver to him as he goes to these talks. and the driver typically sits in the back of the room and listens and they are on their way to a presentation and the driver says, you know, professor, i've heard your presentation so many times, i think i could give it. well, the professor, always being interested in a good experiment, says, fine, let's try it. so they get to the auditorium and the driver takes off his chauffeur's hat, the professor puts it on, the professor sits in the back of the room and the driver gets up and gives a very highly articulate and persuasive speech, at the end of which some smart ass reporter, probably a science writer for the chronicle, asks a very erudite complex technical question. the speaker looks at him and says, that's the dumbest question i have ever heard. and the answer is so simple, i'm going to ask my driver to explain it to you. so in today's play, leslie lako plays the role of the driver. i think we have to acknowledge that the members of the public are at quite different stages in their understanding of climate change and how to deal with it. and i think some of these different stages involve first those who are simply ignorant of the issue. they just don't know a thing about it. now, fortunately i know we don't have anyone here in that category. there's also a group of people who are simply unwilling to listen because al gore is the main messenger. their view, and i think there's a few of them in the bay area, but i do know some, their view is, i didn't vote for him so he has to be wrong. i think there are others that are convinced because al gore is the messenger. those are the folks who say, i voted for him so he has to be right. and i saw his movie and it scared the crap out of me but i don't know what to do other than change my light bulbs. i think there are some that are concerned but they are skeptical. they say, we need more scientific study. we need to consider both sides of the argument. this may be a natural phenomenon. as the mayor said, maybe it's volcanos. i think you will find several members of the former majority party of the congress of the united states and some large energy company executives in this group. there are some that are concerned, but it isn't a problem to them personally. they are the ones that say, look, i'm worried about transfats in my diet, about my kids' education, about the noise coming from my volvo's transmission, about potential earthquakes and the leak in my basement. i frankly don't have any emotional capacity to take on any more problems. by the way, since i was planning to move to a warmer climate when i retire, maybe it's not such a bad problem that it's going to get warmer in san francisco. there are those who are convinced that it's a problem but they say there's little we can do about it. what does it matter what san francisco, the bay area, california, even the united states, does if china and india keep pumping pollutants into the air? there are some that are convinced that it is a serious problem but don't know what we as individuals or the organizations or corporations we work for can constructively do about it. i think that largely takes in where a lot of us are today. and then, finally, there are the entrepreneurs. those are the folks who realize there is either money to be made or costs to be avoided, like getting out in front of the competition on this issue. and this group we find a lot in the bay area where we have a lot of innovative businesses. i hope there's something in my comments for everybody in each of these categories today, but i think we should keep that in mind. this is san francisco bay. it's upside down, but from australia's perspective, that's just fine. it is the largest estuary on the west coast. i hope this isn't an omen of all of the slides because we're going to all have to turn funny. it's the largest estuary on the west coast on both the north and south american continents. it's a region that's home to about 7 million people. it's beautiful, prosperous, a spectacular place. this is my beat. this is where i work. now, this is the bay back in the middle of the 19th century. the yellow area shows where the bay used to be, where the tidal wetlands were. it used to be much bigger than it is today. but siltation from hydraulic gold mining, diking to create salt ponds and duck hunting clubs, garbage dumps along the shore of the bay and frankly land fill operations to create real estate reduced the size of the bay by about a third between 1849 and 1960. that's when the united states army corps of engineers produced this map. it was intended to show that it was economically feasible and, in fact, desirable to fill another 60 percent of the bay. that was their intention. instead, when this map was published it alarmed the public and it motivated them to take action to prevent the bay from becoming little more than a broad river. they didn't like what the corps had predicted. the science fiction writer ray bradbury says the purpose of science fiction isn't to predict the future, it's to prevent the future that's described. i don't think the corps of engineers intended this report to fall into the category of great science fikds, but that's what happened. the present day bay looks more like this. bcdc was created to stop the uncontrolled filling of the bay and we've done that. in fact, we've reversed the shrinking of the bay. it's now 8,000 acres larger than it was 40 years ago and the conversion of salt ponds in the north and south bay to wetlands will make it another 26,000 acres larger. we are very proud of what we have accomplished. not all government agencies know what they are supposed to do. fewer even do it. we do. well, our smug self-aduration was interrupted last year in march when the california climate change center published a report titled, changing climate, assessing the risk to california. the report looked at 3 scenarios for cutting the amounts of emission that we pump into the atmosphere and depending on whether and how much green house gas emissions can be brought under control, the report projects by the end of the century average temperatures in california will rise between 3 and 10 1/2 degrees centigrade. one of the most publicized impacts of global warming is a predicted increase in sea level. and here's a graph showing sea level rise in san francisco bay. now, i want to note one very important fact about this graph. it does not show predicted sea level rise. it shows how much the level of the bay has risen over the past century. since 1900, the bay waters have risen 7 inches. and we at bcdc have been monitoring this increase for decades and we have been especially concerned because ground elevation, particularly in the south bay, is sinking because of ground water extraction. so even if there's no sea level rise, we expect more flooding as the low-lying areas continue to sink. therefore, over 20 years ago we published a report warning of a dangerous sea level rise in the bay area and the predictions that we made then have shown, unfortunately, to be pretty accurate. it's happening. so, for us in the bay area, reports about sea level rise don't belong in the science prediction section of the library. they belong over in the history section. it's happening here. the same california climate change report i mentioned predicts sea level increases of between 4 inches and 3 feet, 1 meter, by 2100. now, since the bay has risen 7 inches in the past century, and the amount of green house gasses being emitted are continuing, it's hard for me to understand how we could only have a 3-inch rise in the next hundred years. but if you want to understand, ask leslie lako. she understands very clearly. if it turns out that sea level rise is closer to 3 feet over the next century, here are two maps. the one on the left shows what the bay looked like in 1849. the other one shows what it will look like in 2100. as you can see, they look pretty much the same, and that's the good news because the bay surface that was lost to diking and filling in the first century after california became a state would once again become part of the bay. the bad news is we have built all kinds of very expensive stuff that's critical to civilization in the bay area on most of that filled land. let me show you a few examples. this is san francisco international airport. the dark blue is where the bay is now. the light blue is where it will be with a one meter rise in sea level. that's oakland international airport. clearly they should be building sea planes. that's silicon valley. now, just for fun, we mapped the san francisco public utility commission's waste water treatment commission. as you can see, a lot of it is along the shore line. so we've used some gis projections and we have had to use a two meter sea level rise because of the base maps we used, but you see a lot of that area would be inundated. even if it's only half as much, there's still a lot of expensive puc infrastructure that's going to be under water. under the heading of sharing the pain, i want to point out that bcdc's objectives will also be hard hit by sea level rise. over the past 40 years, we have required a lot of public access along the shore line of the bay, about a hundred miles of it. and a lot more access has been provided in public parks and through the bay trail. much of this could well be lost. now, after all this talk of doom and gloom, i have to put a caveat in here. bay waters won't rise slowly like -- and evenly like water filling a bathtub. the tide comes in, the tide goes out. so what we're talking about are trends in mean sea level. i prefer to use the term climate change to global warming when we're talking about this phenomenon we're dealing with because overall while the earth's atmosphere will be getting warmer, some places will be getting hotter, others will be getting cooler and the climate will become much more erratic. some years the bay area may go through extended droughts. other years we may get unusually heavy rainfall. and it's during these storms that we'll face the most serious problems because when rainfall runs off the hill sides into the bay and that water piles up on top of a high tide and that high tide is on top of sea level rise, and the winds push all that water across the bay, so that it acts as a dam to the additional water that's running off from the hills, that's when we'll see extensive damage and we will see it far more often. now, in addition to sea level rise, the climate change is expected to result to more precipitation in the sierra nevada falling as rain, less as snow and an earlier snow melt and this will reduce the spring and summer runoff which will allow salinity levels and salt water to extend about 9 miles farther into the delta than it does now. now, i don't think i need to remind you that a lot of folks in the central valley and southern california get their water through the delta. and they expect that it will be fresh rather than salty. now that i've completely depressed you, let me give you the good news. even though i showed you a map of san francisco international airport under water in 2100, it won't happen. san francisco won't become the venice of the west. silicon valley won't become the loss city of atlantis, and salt water won't come out the taps in southern california. why? because however much it costs we can't afford to let this happen. so we will build levies around the airports, we will build a seawall around the san francisco waterfront. flood control is already being incorporated into the planning for the salt pond to wetland conversion project in the south bay and we'll change the way we store and move fresh water around california. economically, we don't have any other choice. but the cost will be enormous. and where we'll get the money and what other important investments and expenditures we'll have to forego to afford this are the bigger questions. but we do have other choices. there may be some areas along the bay shore line where it's more cost effective to remove existing development and replace it with flood-absorbing wet lands than it is to protect the low value structures. there may be areas, particularly in the delta, where it's better to halt planned development than it is to allow the development to be built and then face the cost of trying to protect it from inevitable flooding. clearly, what we have to do is figure out how much it will cost to protect everything that's vulnerable to flooding, figure out how much everything that might flood is worth, and then develop a thoughtful regional strategy that effectively deals with this issue. the choice of moving aggressively to reduce green house gasses so the sea level rise we have to deal with is at the lower end of the spectrum that the scientists tell us we should be planning. it's too late to prevent climate change and sea level rise. they are already happening. and even if we shut down all the power plants and park all of our cars, there is so much green house gas in the atmosphere it will continue to get warmer. in many ways we're in the same position as the captain of the titanic was. what was his name? edward j. smith. at the speed he was going, by the time he saw the iceberg, it was inevitable that he would hit it, no matter what he did. but we can cushion the blow. we hope that just as the 1960 army corps of engineers map which showed how small the bay could become galvanized citizens to take action, our maps showing how much bigger it might be will bring the message home that climate change is real, that it will affect each of us personally, and that we have to do something about it. california can be justifiablely proud of the leadership position we've taken in our efforts to reduce green house gasses. it is my humble opinion that president george w. bush would have never acknowledged climate change in his state of the union speech last week had it not been for california. if we can enlighten the president, surely china and india will listen. in a little over a year, climate change has exploded from an issue most people doubted existed, to an issue everyone wants to do something about. and i think we are now in the phase of trying to figure out what everybody else is doing so we don't trip over each other and can figure out where we fit in solving the puzzle. this summit is a very important step in this process. i thank you for inviting me. we at bcdc look forward to continuing to work with you, both because we should and because we must. al gore got it right. he says dealing with climate change is not so much an environmental, scientific political or economic issue as it is a moral one. at some point, our children or our grandchildren will ask us, how could you have not seen what was happening and why didn't you do more to stop it? we have to be able to look them in the eyes and say truthfully, as soon as we recognized the problem, we did everything we could to solve it. thank you for giving me the privilege of talking with you today. . >> i'd like to say good morning to everybody. it's a great privilege to* for me to be here. it's going to be a very exciting two days for me and i hope for you as well. i'd like to say thank you very much to the organizers for inviting me today. i'm david baumforth and i'd like to share experiences of what's been going on in the uk and also for me to share what's been going on here as well. in talking about what we've been doing in the uk in relation to our adaptation strategies for flooding and coastal defense, i want to talk through a few of the strategic projects we've been undertaking, one of them for the uk (inaudible) climate change in relation to urban flooding and foresight project, which is the uk government project for climate change, flooding and coastal defense. government guidance note on planning, talking about making space for water in urban design, the construction industry in the uk's design guidance for managing extreme events or managing exceedence and finally the government's policy guidance in the uk on integrated approaches to urban drainage. now, the picture on climate change is all too familiar. this is a graph of projected global warming and temperature rise and its effects northwest europe and particularly the uk. it's a very similar picture to the one you have here. it predicts however you account for the uncertainty, a very significant rise in temperature over the next 50 to 100 years. as a result of that average temperature rise of at least 3 degrees centigrade is that we are going to see warmer, weter winters, drier, hotter summers, a sea level rise in excess of 800 millimeters, probably 850 millimeters, in the southeast of england. but hidden underneath that are perhaps more important messages. that temperature rise will lead to much stormier weather so when we get rainfall we're likely to see particularly and interestingly in the summer months much more intense rainfall in the future than we see today and on top of any sea level rise, as will mentioned, increase in storm surges which will exacerbate the sea level rise even more. what we're looking at is what does that mean if that occurs how will we adapt our urban areas to adeal with this? at the present time we have something in excess of 80,000 properties at immediate risk from flooding within urban areas in the uk. the annual damage cost at the moment is something like $270 million pounds. that's about $500 million per annum, and the annual cost of flood mitigation is on the order of $320 million pounds. that's a huge sum of money that's already invested in flood protection work in the uk. when we look at the impact of climate change and particularly the effects on the sort of storm events that leads to flooding in urban areas and, indeed, in rural areas as well, we are looking in the uk at something up to around 40 percent increase in rainfall intensity. and when we model that effect on our urban drainage systems on our river channels, we see that that will lead to something understandablely of the order of 40 percent increase in the flows in those drainage systems. but because those drainage systems are already nearing capacity, that has a disproportionate effect on the amount of flooding and the amount of damage that might occur. we expect to see 100 percent increase in flood volumes on the surface, doubling the flood volume. 130 percent increase in the number of properties affected and a 200 percent increase in the damage of that flooding. that's a three-fold increase in damage costs. that's just looking at that fairly narrow band of flood control and damaged property in urban areas. one of the difficulties of trying to look at the future is the uncertainty of what the future might look like. this graph is taken from the government's foresight project on flooding and coastal defense and the effects of climate change. there are four bands on here. the left-hand band is the present scenario. that's a summary of the average annual damage as a result of flooding in the uk. then we have four other bands and these are the four future scenarios. this is looking at really the world economic environment and how that might change in the future. the left is an economic environment that is based on world markets driving the economy. the next one is based on natural enterprise driving the economy. the next one is one of local ownership, everything reduced
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