Potential Inundation due to Rising Sea Levels in the San Francisco Bay Region
VISUALIZATION (click here for downloadable data layers)
This map shows a color-coded representation of vulnerability to inundation by average 100-year high-water levels for different amounts of sea level rise. Please wait a few moments for the data to download. The globe should rotate and zoom in on the San Francisco Bay area. Initially, you may only be able to see the areas in dark blue around the Bay, which represent areas vulnerable to a 100-year flood today. Most of these areas are currently behind levees or other protective structures, and would only be inundated if those structures were to fail. When you zoom in further, you will begin to see the smaller areas shaded in light blue, yellow, and red that correspond to areas at risk of inundation under different amounts of projected future sea level rise (50, 100, and 150 cm, relative to mean sea level in the year 2000).
Areas designated as wetlands in the NLCD01 dataset are excluded from this map.
If you don't see the map above, you will need to download the Google Earth plugin. Alternatively, you can download the corresponding Google Earth data file and open it in the standalone Google Earth application. This will allow you to further customize the view of this dataset.
The following publication describes the development of and some implications of these maps:
Knowles, Noah. 2010. Potential Inundation Due to Rising Sea Levels in the San Francisco Bay Region. California Climate Change Center. San Francisco Estuary and Watershed Science, 8:1. Available at http://escholarship.org/uc/search?entity=jmie_sfews;volume=8;issue=1
Please direct any inquiries concerning these data to Noah Knowles.
This work was funded by by the California Energy Commission's Public Interest Energy Research Program (PIER) through the California Climate Change Center at Scripps Institution of Oceanography, and by the CALFED Science Program through the USGS CASCaDE Project.
