Nature is dynamic, a fact that human societies often choose to ignore, especially when change is not in the desired direction.
Located at the interface between land, sea and air, coasts are environments where this dynamism is best seen. The movement of waves, the rhythm of tides, the migration of dunes are phenomena that can be observed over the short and medium term.
Through historical, sedimentary and geophysical records, it is possible to reconstruct past sea-level changes and much broader phenomena such as the waxing and waning of ice-masses and the formation of ocean basins.
Coastal landscapes and ecosystems are also characteristically dynamic, and evolve in different paces, some abrupt (following for example the collapse of a cliff or flooding during a storm surge), others slow (such as the gradual growth of a tidal marsh or a coral barrier).
Photo credit: COMTESS – Elke Wegener (2011)
Photo credit: COMTESS – A. C. de la Vega-Leinert (2009)
Photo credit: COMTESS – Elke Wegener (2011)
Coasts, moreover, are ecologically rich regions that are particularly attractive for human societies. Coastal areas concentrate a large part of world populations and economic assets. This concentration in a rapidly changing environment is what makes coastal populations vulnerable, especially when protective coastal buffers (such as dunes or mangroves) are destroyed to make room for yet more human settlements and activities.
Climate change exacerbates these trends in particular via increasing sea levels, coastal erosion, flooding, extreme events and salinization of freshwater resources.
One key strategy to face the dynamism inherent to coasts has historically been to avoid impacts via the construction of hard structures, such as dikes and storm barriers. However, this form of adaptation is costly, requires strong governance, and tends to displace problems further along the coast, rather than solve them. In recent decades, softer approaches, such as beach nourishment, have been developed. However, these come with their own problems, for example sand scarcity.
A controversial approach is managed realignment, i.e. the planed removal or inland displacement of specific hard defences to restore semi-natural coastal dynamics, ecosystems and buffers. Managed realignment implies allowing coastal erosion and flooding to a certain extent. Land use on drained agricultural polders behind dikes, may give way to extensive pasture on salt meadows that thrive on temporary flooding.
Although managed realignment is in Germany only envisaged in sparsely inhabited low-lying coastal areas, it often meets low societal acceptance and is politically difficult to implement. One way out of this conundrum, is to actively involve the population affected in decision-making and seek synergies that may bring local benefits and compensate the losses incurred.
Photo credit: COMTESS – Elke Wegener (2012)
Photo credit: A.C. de la Vega-Leinert, 2017
Key challenges are:
- to understand the social, cultural, economic and political barriers to Nature-based coastal adaptation
- to foster adequate planning in coastal areas and sustainable management of coastal resources,
- to develop forms of governance and management that truly work with coastal populations to seek acceptable alternatives.
Publications
Ecosystems
Schröter D, Cramer W, Leemans R, Prentice CI, Araújo Arnell NW, Bondeau A, Bugmann H, Carter TR, Garcia CA, de la Vega-Leinert AC, Erhard M, Ewert F, Glendinning M, House JI, Kankaanpää S, Klein RJT, Lavorel S, Lindner M, Metzger MJ, Meyer M, Mitchell T, Reginster I, Rounsevell M, Sabaté S, Sticht S, Smith B, Smith J, Smith P, Sykes MT, Thonicke K, Thuiller W, Tuck G, Zaehle S, Zierl B (2005). Ecosystem service supply and vulnerability to global change in Europe. Science 310 (5752), 1333-1337. Doi: 10.1126/science.1115233. science.sciencemag.org
Cramer et al. (2001). Europe. In McCarthy, J.J. Canziani, O.F., Leary, N.A., Dokken, D.J. & White, K.S.: Climate Change 2001: Impacts, Adaptation, and Vulnerability. Contribution of Working Group II to the Third Assessment Reportof the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press. 643-692. www.ipcc.ch
Coastal Adaptation
de la Vega-Leinert AC, Stoll-Kleemann S (2020). Ausgleich für den Küstenschutz. Meer & Küste 18: 16-17. eucc-d-inline.databases.eucc-d.de
de la Vega-Leinert AC, Stoll-Kleemann S, Wegener E (2018). Managed Realignment on the Eastern German Baltic Sea: A Catalyst for Conflict or for a Coastal Zone Management Consensus? Journal of Coastal Research 34(3): 586–601. Doi: 10.2112/JCOASTRES-D-15-00217.1 meridian.allenpress.com
Stoll-Kleemann S, Benke H, Frenzel B, Kleyer M, Maier M, Martin M, Stadler M, de la Vega-Leinert AC (2016). Neues vom Meer – Vor uns die Sintflut – angepasste Küstenschutzstrategien im Einklang mit Mensch und Natur!? Dokumentation des 15. Podiumsgespräches am 20. November 2014, Ozeaneum Stralsund. Geozon, Greifswald. www.deutsches-meeresmuseum.de
Fritz-Vietta NVM, de la Vega-Leinert AC, Stoll-Kleemann S (2015). Landscape change in the Fischland-Darß-Zingst region (Northern Germany) – Implications for local people’s sense of regional belonging. In: Stoll-Kleemann, Susanne (ed.) (2015): Local Perceptions and Preferences for Landscape and Land Use in the Fischland-Darß-Zingst Region, German Baltic Sea, Greifswalder Geographische Arbeiten 51: 1-40. Institut für Geographie und Geologie, Universität Greifswald. geo.uni-greifswald.de
de la Vega-Leinert AC, Nicholls RJ (2008). Potential Implications of Sea-Level Rise for Great Britain. Journal of Coastal Research 24 (2), 342-357. Doi: 10.2112/07A-0008.1. bioone.org
Nicholls RJ, de la Vega-Leinert AC (2008). Implications of sea-level rise for Europe’s coasts: an introduction. Journal of Coastal Research, 24(2): 285–287. bioone.org
Past Coastal Changes
de la Vega-Leinert AC, Smith DE, Jones RL (2012). Holocene Coastal Barrier Development at Bay of Carness, Mainland Island, Orkney, Scotland. Scottish Geographical Journal 128(2): 119-147. Doi: 10.1080/14702541.2012.716605. www.tandfonline.com
de la Vega-Leinert AC, Smith DE, Jones RL (2007). Holocene coastal environmental changes on the periphery of an area of glacio-isostatic uplift: an example from Scapa Bay, Orkney, Scotland, UK. Journal of Quaternary Science 22 (8): 755-772. Doi: 10.1002/jqs.1100 onlinelibrary.wiley.com
de la Vega Leinert AC, Keen DH, Jones RL, Wells JM, Smith DE (2000). Mid-Holocene environmental changes in the Bay of Skaill, mainland Orkney, Scotland: an integrated geomorphological, sedimentological and stratigraphical study. Journal of Quaternary Science 15 (5): 509-528. Doi: 10.1002/1099-1417(200007)15:5<509::AID-JQS529>3.0.CO;2-T. onlinelibrary.wiley.com