Rising Sea Levels, Disappearing Islands
Tuvalu is a group of nine coral atolls totaling 10 square miles scattered over 500,000 square miles of ocean south of the equator and west of the international date line. It is the smallest of all nations, except for the Vatican, with 11,000 residents. Tuvalu has no industry, burns little petroleum, and creates less carbon pollution than a small town in America. This tiny place, nevertheless, is on the front line of climate change. The increasing intensity of tropical weather, the increase in ocean temperatures, and rising sea level -- all documented results of a warming atmosphere -- are making trouble for Tuvalu.

Sea level rise is the greatest problem. Tuvalu's highest elevation is 4.6 meters (15 feet), but most of it is no more than a meter (3.3 feet) above the sea. Several times each year the regular lunar cycle of tides, riding on the ever higher mean sea level, brings the Pacific sloshing onto roads and into neighborhoods. In the center of the larger islands the sea floods out of old barrow pits and even squirts up out of the coral bedrock. Puddles bubble up that eventually cover part of the airport on the main island of Funafuti (inset) and inundate homes that are not along the ocean.