Climate alarmism, fueled by globalist agendas, has long predicted the disastrous submerging of coastal land due to rising sea levels. However, new data has shattered these fears, revealing that Earth’s land area has been increasing rather than shrinking. Chris Morrison, Environment Editor at The Daily Sceptic, highlights the facts that challenge decades of panic-driven narratives about climate change.
In 2023, UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres claimed that rising sea levels would cause a “mass exodus of entire populations,” particularly in coastal areas like the Himalayas. This dire prediction fits the familiar narrative of billions of climate refugees fleeing inundated lands. Yet, research from as far back as 2016 shows a striking contrast to the alarmist claims.
National Geographic reported that, since 1985, the planet has gained more land than it has lost to rising waters, including a significant land expansion in Bangladesh.
One of the key studies, conducted by the Deltares Research Institute in the Netherlands, utilized satellite data to map changes in global coastlines. It found that coastal areas have increased by more than 13,000 km² worldwide. This contradicts the popular belief that rising sea levels are erasing land.
In fact, Bangladesh, long cited as one of the most vulnerable countries to climate change, has experienced a 13.7% growth in its coastal region since 1990.
Dr. Fedor Baart, a researcher at Deltares, expressed his surprise at the findings, saying, “We expected that the coast would start to retreat due to sea level rise, but the most surprising thing is that the coasts are growing all over the world.” This evidence suggests that both natural processes, such as the retreat of post-glacial ice sheets, and human activities, including land reclamation, have contributed to the growth of coastlines across the globe.
The ongoing trend of land expansion contradicts the widespread alarmist predictions about the irreversible effects of sea-level rise. For instance, while the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) continues to forecast a rise of up to one meter in sea levels by the end of the century, tidal gauges show a much slower increase of around 2mm per year—far below the catastrophic figures touted by the media.
Alarmist rhetoric has been further pushed by organizations like the World Economic Forum (WEF), which recently predicted the collapse of the Greenland ice sheet and a rise of one to two meters in sea levels. However, these sensational claims are increasingly being debunked by real-world data and studies showing that the rise in sea levels is not as severe as once claimed.