Abstract:
Sturgis paints a grim future for North Carolina's Outer Banks and coastal counties in the twenty-first century. Global warming is predicted to produce rising oceans levels from fourteen inches to three feet, temperature ranges from four to ten degrees higher than current levels, and more powerful tropical storms. Climate change is a vast and serious problem, but in North Carolina many organizations are bringing people together to address this critical problem. Senate Bill 1134 and House Bill 1191 would establish a commission drawn from these various groups to study the problem. Both this group and the proposed legislation faces opposition from politically powerful corporate interests. Meanwhile, the state's coastline continues to erode.