Impact of Climate Change on Gulf of Mexico Ecosystem and Economy

Climate Change on The Gulf of Mexico Tyler Zigmond Southern New Hampshire University October 22, 2023

Abstract Ever since the dawn of the industrial revolution, climate change has reached a new high. The average temperature of the Earth has increased, the sea levels have risen, and because of this, our coastlines have been encroached upon. When you look at the economy, ecosystem, and communities of these coastal area, specifically in the Gulf of Mexico, you will see that they are affected by climate change in some serious ways. As we look at the effect of climate change, we see that there is a correlation between the temperature of the Earth and the gradual rise in the Sea Level. As the water heats up and the water rises, it has a noticeable change in the ecosystem and on the geography of the region. Sea levels rising mean that the coastline is slowly receding, and eventually as time goes on, it will begin to take away enough of the coastal land that it begins to harm the community that is there. There is also the effect on the ecosystem of the Gulf, where the rising water temperatures can cause dead zones in the water, where there are places where organisms can't live. (NOAA 2023). These hotter waters also mean that the formation of hurricanes and tropical storms are increasing (CCES 2020). As we looked at the data, we saw that the climate change did harm the ecosystem in the Gulf of Mexico, did cause the sea level to rise, and did cause the more storms which all have a negative impact on the coastline of the Gulf. Introduction When you live near the water, be it a river, lake, or ocean, you see every day how important that body of water is to the area around you. Living in Texas, I am either a few minutes or hours from these areas of water, and they each have a culture built around them. Rockport is a treasure trove of fishing spots and beaches, and New Braunfels has an entire part of

its economy built around the rivers in the area. The people, the economy, and the parts of the enviornment all have a dependence on the balance of having water around them. Over the last 150 years, the acceleration of climate change have shown to be a danger to these areas. Hotter temperatures, sea level change and environmental changes all show to be affected by climate change. Each of these also can be a danger to the life style and area surounding the water. When researching this topic, there is a specific question that I want answered: If global warming and climate change continue on their path towards the future, how much of a danger is this to the Gulf of Mexico, and the surrounding communities living on the bordering coastline? The reason that I have thought of doing this is because I realize how important water is to society. When settlers arrive in an area, they found water ways to build a community around. We need water to survive, to travel, the transport good, and for recreation. As climate change continues and worsens, you will see exactly how dangerous this is humanity. If we can think of ways to reduce the effect we have had on climate change, we might be able to avoid the eventual harm to the 1680 miles of Gulf coastline (Gupta, R., 2020). In previous courses, I have studied the effect that climate change has on droughts, floods, and tropical storms. This research led me to look at how climate change will directly affect the Gulf Coast. When looking at what hypothesis I tested, it was that as global temperatures increase, the sea level would continue to rise and take over the coast line and the amount of hurricanes will increase as temperatures rise. There two are ones I focused on mostly because they can both cause permanent, lasting damage to the area of the gulf coast. Seeing that climate change is fueling these, you can see how important it is to realize the correlation.

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Data Collection When you live in a city that is built on the coast or a river, you can see clearly how important the water is to your economy an way of life. Businesses are built around the busy seasons, and tourists are such a huge part of keeping everything afloat. When you look at the steady climb of the global temperature, you can see how things have risen by almost 2 degrees Fahrenheit in the last 140 years since the industrial revolution began. With those temperatures rising, ice has been melting. This has had a contribution to the almost 9 inches the global sea level has risen in that same time (Meehl, 2005) I looked at the rise of sea waters and the projection of the same kind on areas along the gulf coast. I wanted to see how much of the land is projected to be lost in the next few centuries. Along with this, I am going to be looking into the number of hurricanes that have happened in the gulf and the predicted hurricanes that will happen in the future.The main kind of data collection I used was data analysis. I gathered past data for the last 140 years and used it to predict how things will look in another century and a half. I believe that when using these two

separate categories of information, I was able to make accurate estimations on if climate change had a direct influence on the harmful changes in changes in the gulf. One of the most harmful results of climate change on the gulf is the hypoxia that has expanded over time. Below are the diagram and map of the spread of hypoxia up to the year of 2021 (Lyons, 2021).

By using an interactive map, I will be able to layer the information to where you can compare the different time periods (which will be a slightly higher temperature and sea level) with how the economy should be, along with how it is predicted to be with the change. Having the different layers for the different times of the year, I believe this will allow us to see how much of an effect is really being seen. The goal is to see if the water levels rise another 9 inches in the next century and a half, will that harm the areas or is that concern for further down the road. Data analysis seemed like the best fit for this research question because it allows us to have an easy to read/understand map that will show the different layers on eachother. Not all of the layers will matter together, so being able to see how the certain ones interact will be the most important part of the research. Methodologies and Analysis When working to collect information, it was really important to recognize which information could be compared to eachother. I will be using data analysis in order to compare

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and contrast the data that is collected. I used ArcGIS to map out the data, along with collecting data from different government websites. The NOAA actually had a lot of the correct data collections and charts that I was able to pull together to analyze and get great conclusions out of. This below line graph shows a great trajectory into the future on how we suspect sea levels to rise. The types of data that I collected were the difference in global average temperature, rise in overall global temperature and the amount that the sea level has risen from the NOAA. I also

began drawing information on the coastal cities from the NOAA, Bureau of Economic Analysis, and from some local city websites. Gathering all of this information, I am able to get the information to be plugged into ArcGIS in order to test and observe the information. I needed to have a large sample size because with out it, we wouldnt be able to compare the temperature change and the sea level rise. Going back around 150 years will allow us to predict into the future on how things should trend. Being able to also see the number of tropical storms and hurricanes in the gulf of mexico and atlantic ocean (since the storms begin here) is very important as well. An alternative tool that I could have used was surveying. I could have collected information from different areas and compared them as well. I could have also used climates as a comparison point for this as well. Because while some areas could be rising slower with temperature or sea level, or have naturally better economies than here in Texas. I ended up not doing that because it would add enough to the study to be beneficial. [ One thing that everyone can see, is that when you look over the different charts, maps and graphs, you can see that everything has growth overtime. This shows a correlation between the temperature rising and all of the negative impacts on the

Gulf of Mexico .] Conclusion and Recommendations For my research paper, I decided to focus on the effect that climate change has on the coastal region of the Gulf of Mexico’s Texas area. With the rise of the Earth’s global temperature, gradual changes come to the coast of Texas. The economy, ecosystem, and general way of life can all be affected by the rise in temperature in a negative way. When choosing which maps and diagrams were going to be used for this report, it was

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important to see the connections between the date, the location, and the time frame. Since the rise in global temperatures occurs so gradual, the effects that it would have on the gulf coast takes time for the trend to appear ( Dahlman, R. L. A. L, 2022)When looking at the information layered over itself on the map, you dont actually see the largest correlation. This is because of the time frame that it took for the changes to happen. It wasnt in specific generalized areas that the temperatures happened, so you needed to look at the effects and then find the correlation between that and the cause. The final results of the analysis did end up correlating to my original hypothesis, and when looking at the prediction for the future, it continues to have strong positive correlations to my initial hypothesis. That is, that the global climate change and rise in temperatures would have a negative effect on coastal area of the Gulf of Mexico. You are able to see that the temperature of the earth has risen over time, which in turn, caused the rising of the sea level and the rise in water temperatures. This rise in temperatures caused the sea water to slowly start taking over the coastline, harm the environment by causing dead zones in the Gulf, and caused a gradual increase in the severity and number of tropical storms that cost the coastal cities economically due to the damage (U.S. Geological Survey, 2023). When I first began the project, I was focused on just the economic effects of climate

change on coastal settlements. As I conducted more research, I saw that the economic effects were just a small part of the harm that global warming has on these areas. While losing coastline can be detrimental, the real harm that I saw was the steady increase in the severity of tropical storms. A question that arises to this, is when you look at the natural cooling and heating periods of Earth, will a cooling period occur before the trend from my research reaches cataclysmic levels? If I had to do further research on this, I would like to look at a predictions for the path of global warming over a longer period of time. I feel like if we could have an idea of how fast we are approaching dangerous levels of climate change, then we could possibly begin to have real cutbacks in the human effect on the accelerated rise. When looking over all of the data that I collected, a clear conclusion was seen in the effect that climate change had on the Gulf of Mexico and its northern coastline. Looking to the future, it is safe to say that some homes and communities that are directly on the water will be lost in the next 100-150 years. I would begin either working on levees or moving the communities to a higher elevation in the area. In order to stop the increase in tropical storms, we really are going to need to come up with a plan together across the globe to lower our carbon footprint. Because as the Earth has gotten hotter and will continue to get hotter as things stand, a lot of the coastline can be destroyed in the not too far away future by constant coastal storms. References

Meehl, G. (2005, March). How Much More Global Warming and Sea Level Rise? https://learn.snhu.edu/d2l/le/content/1392415/viewContent/26621910/View Gupta, R. (2020, November). Domestic and International Drivers of the Demand for Water Resources in the Context of Water Scarcity: A Cross-Country Study . https://eds-s-ebscohost- com.ezproxy.snhu.edu/eds/detail/detail?vid=11&sid=103258aa-e953-42aa-8927- e659f9c54475%40redis&bdata=JnNpdGU9ZWRzLWxpdmUmc2NvcGU9c2l0ZQ%3d %3d#AN=1966485&db=ecn. https://libguides.snhu.edu/c.php?g=883158&p=6345615 Lawman, A. E., Dee, S. G., DeLong, K. L., & Correa, A. M. (2022). Rates of future climate change in the Gulf of Mexico and the Caribbean Sea: Implications for coral reef ecosystems. Journal of Geophysical Research: Biogeosciences , 127 (9). https://doi.org/10.1029/2022jg006999 Analyze . Analyze | U.S. Geological Survey. (2023). https://www.usgs.gov/data- management/analyze The Gulf of Mexico is getting warmer . National Centers for Environmental Information (NCEI). (2023, February 1). https://www.ncei.noaa.gov/news/gulf-mexico-getting- warmer#:~:text=Oceanic%20warming%20can%20exacerbate%20many,and%20the%20loss %20of%20wetlands. Dahlman, R. L. A. L. (2022). Climate change: Ocean heat content . NOAA Climate.gov. https://www.climate.gov/news-features/understanding-climate/climate-change-ocean-heat- content NHC. (2020). Tropical Cyclone Climatology . Tropical cyclone climatology. https://www.nhc.noaa.gov/climo/

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Lyons, jennie. (2021, August 3). Larger-than-average Gulf of Mexico ‘dead zone’ measured . NOAA. https://www.noaa.gov/news-release/larger-than-average-gulf-of-mexico-dead-zone- measured Knutson, T. (2020, September). Global warming and Hurricanes . GFDL. https://www.gfdl.noaa.gov/global-warming-and-hurricanes/ Lumpkin, R. (2022, April 19). Sea_level_rise_2022_scenarioupdate . NOAA Climate.gov. https://www.climate.gov/media/14136 CCES. (2020, February 4). Impacts and adaptation options in the Gulf Coast. Center for Climate and Energy Solutions. https://www.c2es.org/document/impacts-and-adaptation-options-in-the- gulf-coast/#:~:text=The%20central%20and%20western%20U.S.,storm%20surge%20and %20high%20waves.

Final Project 320 (2) (1)

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