NEWS ARTICLES
Follow the Coastal Resilience team through recent news coverage.
Researchers put a dollar value on the protection coral reefs provide Hawaii shorelines ... and it’s big
May 4th, 2019
Hawaii News Now
By Ben Gutierrez
Having a nice beach with peaceful waves lapping at the shoreline is often taken for granted in Hawaii. But the reefs also protect the shoreline from larger waves and damage. “If you were standing in Waikiki and you just have little bitty waves lapping up at your feet, but then you look offshore and you can see ten-foot waves or more breaking offshore, well, that’s the reef at work for you,” said Michael Beck...
Hawaii’s reefs provide more than $835M in flood protection, study shows
May 4th, 2019
Star Advertiser
By Nina Wu
A new study places a dollar value on Hawaii’s reefs — not for their natural beauty or as a tourist attraction, but for their function in providing flood protection...
Rebuilt Wetlands Can Protect Shorelines Better Than Walls
April 1st, 2019
Scientific American
By Rowan Jacobsen
On August 27, 2011, Hurricane Irene crashed into North Carolina, eviscerating the Outer Banks. The storm dumped rain shin-high and hurled three-meter storm surges against the barrier island shores that faced the mainland, destroying roads and 1,100 homes...
Coral reefs save billions of dollars worldwide by preventing floods
June 12th, 2018
USA Today
By Doyle Rice
Coral reefs aren't just pretty to look at: They also act as a natural flood protection barrier from powerful ocean storms. But with reefs in danger around the world, much of this valuable flood protection could be lost. A study released Tuesday pinpoints the value of coral reefs, finding coastal flood-related damages around the world would be twice what they are now if not for this natural flood barrier...
The Staggering Scope of the Plastic Threat to Coral Reefs
January 25th, 2018
Atlas Obscura
By Jessica Leigh Hester
Dancing in an ocean current, a single scrap of plastic doesn’t appear especially insidious. Toothless, tailless, twirling, it might look, at first, more evanescent than threatening. But snared on corals or heaped in piles, plastic waste poses deadly risks to vast underwater ecosystems...
To Soften a Hurricane's Blow, Don't Drain the Swamp
September 2nd, 2017
The Atlantic
By Robinson Meyer
Wetlands directly prevented half a billion dollars in damages during Hurricane Sandy, a new study has found. If a hurricane-addled storm surge is barreling toward your coastline, there aren’t many ways to stop it...
As coral reefs die, huge swaths of the seafloor are deteriorating along with them
April 20th, 2017
The Washington Post
By Chris Mooney
U.S. government scientists have found a dramatic impact from the continuing decline of coral reefs: The seafloor around them is eroding and sinking, deepening coastal waters and exposing nearby communities to damaging waves that reefs used to weaken...
