“The fear of the future you feel when you hear about climate change, we’re living it,” said Aurea Sánchez Hernández, a resident of El Bosque in Tabasco, Mexico, where the ocean has swallowed more than 500 meters of beach and destroyed nearly 70 houses.

Like her, scientists and leaders worldwide have long been striving to convince decision-makers and citizens that the climate crisis is not a future problem. “Climate change is already here. It’s terrifying, and it’s only the beginning,” said United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres when the World Meteorological Organization (WMO) stated in July last year that the hottest month on record had just been experienced. Neither Guterres nor the WMO knew then that a new record would be set in June 2024.

Heatwaves, increasingly extreme floods and droughts, forest fires, and rapidly intensifying tropical cyclones make headlines every year. Sea-level rise, another consequence of the crisis, threatens many coastal communities around the world.

According to the International Organization for Migration (IOM), nearly 32 million new internal displacements due to climate-related hazards occurred in 2022 alone. This figure could increase to 216 million by 2050 if specific climate actions are not adopted.

In Aurea Sánchez Hernández’s community, once home to over 200 people, only 12 families remain. In Colombia, members of the Wayuu indigenous community in La Guajira live displaced, far from their land, as the sea continues to advance. In Panama, the relocation to the mainland of an entire island population projected to be submerged has already begun. In Puerto Rico, rising sea levels and increasing cyclone intensity keep an entire municipality on edge. In Guatemala, the ocean progressed one night, swallowing several graves and coffins in the Iztapa cemetery. Coffins were lost in the currents, and a foul odor covered the beach for weeks.

A journalistic alliance between Mongabay Latam, Vorágine, Plaza Pública, and the Centro de Periodismo Investigativo in Puerto Rico investigated these cases. Journalists traveled to the impacted sites and spoke with residents, scientists, authorities, and those who left, pushed by the waves and now yearning for their lives by the sea in other towns. “We’re what you call climate refugees,” said those who had to leave.

June 2024: The Hottest Month in History

Last June was the hottest month recorded globally. The WMO confirmed this in its latest report, which also noted that, according to data from the European Union’s Copernicus Climate Change Service, the global average temperature was 34.7°F above pre-industrial levels for 12 consecutive months.

The information is alarming. For the first time, though temporarily, the planet exceeds the threshold set in the Paris Agreement, which aims to prevent global temperature from rising more than 34.7°F above pre-industrial levels. Not exceeding this threshold is crucial to prevent the impacts of the climate crisis from intensifying further and to keep Earth as we know it today.

Earlier this year, the WMO warned that 2023 was the hottest year on record. The global average temperature was 34.61°F above pre-industrial levels. As the months passed, the figures increased, and judging by the latest reports, 2024 might set a record.

“Unfortunately, the latest figures show that we will temporarily exceed the 34.7°F level more frequently, monthly,” said WMO Secretary-General Celeste Saulo. The situation is concerning, though Saulo stressed that this does not mean the Paris Agreement target is unattainable.

“Losing the 1.5°C (34.7°F) target means exceeding that threshold for a prolonged period, which hasn’t happened,” said Colombian Climatologist Paola Arias, a professor at the Environmental School of the University of Antioquia.

Experts explain that the high temperatures of recent months result largely from the combination of two factors: climate change, driven by increased greenhouse gas concentrations in the atmosphere, and an El Niño episode. “The last three years, from 2020 to 2023, we were in La Niña conditions,” corresponding to the cool phase of the natural climate phenomenon known as the El Niño-Southern Oscillation. “El Niño — the warm phase — arrived for 2023-2024. That has significantly contributed to the high temperatures,” said Arias.

Because the oceans absorb much of that heat — 90% —, one consequence of rising temperatures is the warming of the seas, leading to a global sea-level rise.

According to the WMO, the ocean level reached a historic high in 2023. The agency notes that in the first decade of satellite records — from 1993 to 2002 — the sea level rose at a rate of 0.083 inches annually. In the last 10 years — from 2014 to 2023 — that rate increased to 0.188 inches annually.

There are two basic reasons behind this phenomenon, said Carlos del Castillo, head of the Ocean Ecology Laboratory at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center: high temperatures are melting ice on land, adding more water to the ocean; and “when water heats up, it expands and takes up more volume,” the scientist explained.

According to NASA, since 1880, the global sea level has risen by 7.87 inches, which “is not a small amount, it’s quite a lot,” Del Castillo said. Additionally, by 2100, it is projected to rise between 11.8 and 48 inches. “When we’re talking about 30 centimeters (11.8 inches), that translates significantly inland. When you spill a glass of water, the water doesn’t stay spilled there, in the same spot, but expands; that’s the problem,” the expert explained.

More Information for Decision-Making

Monitoring sea-level rise is not easy, especially since it doesn’t occur uniformly worldwide. “The ocean is extremely complex,” said Del Castillo, partly because it is not a static element. “The Earth rotates on its axis, moving water from one place to another.”

NASA has developed several tools to observe sea-level rise that also allow the non-scientific population to track the situation. One such tool is a map showing blue dots distributed worldwide. Each dot corresponds to monitoring stations installed by scientists. Clicking on them reveals the millimeters that, on average, the ocean rises annually at that location.

In Louisiana, near the Mississippi River’s mouth, the sea level rises more than eight millimeters annually (0.315 inches), well above the global average. In this specific case, Del Castillo said, it is due to a combination of sea-level rise and sinking land, primarily because the Mississippi River is funneled. “When rivers are channeled, seasonal floods, which usually deposit sediments that add height to the land, are eliminated. Removing them contributes to land sinking,” the expert explained.

Del Castillo is unaware of any cases in Latin America with figures as high as Louisiana’s, but that doesn’t mean they don’t exist. The problem, he notes, is that as shown in NASA’s maps, there are only seven monitoring stations in South America, while there are more than 70 in North America. “It’s tragic,” he said, because without information, “adequate measures and public policies cannot be implemented.”

In Guatemala, global projections by Climate Central — a group of scientists researching and informing about climate change effects and solutions — indicate that by 2100, areas around Lake Izabal and the Pacific coast will be entirely underwater. One such coastal area is Iztapa, where the ocean advanced one night in May last year, damaging structures, gravestones, crosses, and complete graves.

However, knowing exactly what is happening in Guatemala requires much more information. “The problem is that we haven’t undertaken the task of measuring this increase (in water levels) locally. We’re now relying only on global projections that tell us, with data from other parts of the world, how the sea level is projected to rise,” said Pilar Velásquez, a biologist specializing in marine coastal ecosystem research and management and climate change adaptation.

What is known is that several “local actions,” as Dr. Alec Torres Freyermuth, a marine sciences and technologies expert and researcher at UNAM’s Institute of Engineering, called them, accelerate erosion. These include destroying and deforesting coastal dunes for road, housing, or port construction, which function as dikes, retaining sand that should naturally reach other locations.

Solutions That Led to More Problems

In different Latin American countries, people have had to move from their communities due to coastal erosion. In some cases, experts point to infrastructure projects that have synergized with sea-level rise, accelerating and intensifying their impacts.

This is what happened in Colombia, when seven spurs more than 100 meters long were installed off Riohacha, the capital of the department of La Guajira, in 2007. The work succeeded in slowing the progression of the sea at the beaches where it was erected but redirected the force of the waves toward the coastal communities located to the southwest. “They improved a problem for the city but made it worse for the rural poor,” said Clarena Fonseca Uriana, an indigenous Wayúu leader of the Twuliá community, from where five families have been displaced. The sea has swallowed trees, houses, and boats.

This is why the proposed construction of two breakwaters in Puerto Rico to prevent some neighborhoods in Arecibo from being submerged raises concerns.

Geologist Maritza Barreto Orta, who has studied Puerto Rico’s beaches for over 25 years, argues that the coastal erosion threatening Barrio Obrero in Arecibo is due to wave diversion caused by a stone-walled pier built last century, exacerbated by the climate crisis in recent decades.

Satellite image analysis shows that the coastline in the Mexican community of El Bosque in Tabasco has been retreating continuously since at least 2015.

Hundreds of people have had to leave their homes. “Give me good news, tell me that with a wall or some construction, we can save the community,” said Guadalupe Cobos, one of the few who still resist the sea’s encroachment in El Bosque, to Lilia Gama, a researcher at the Juárez Autonomous University of Tabasco. “It was sad to tell them there was no way to save the community,” said Gama. “These structures, over time, become more harmful and increase coastal erosion,” said Alec Torres, marine sciences and technologies expert and researcher at UNAM.

The Importance of Designing Comprehensive Strategies

The International Organization for Migration warns that sea-level rise-induced displacements are not only due to housing loss but also to food security issues. Saltwater intrusion can affect freshwater sources and land food production.

Additionally, marine food sources can also be impacted. “Many organisms depend on sea depth. If you’re increasing depth, you’re changing their ecosystem, potentially negatively affecting them,” Del Castillo said.

Furthermore, Del Castillo added that sea-level rise is associated with higher water temperatures, acidity, and storm surge intensity. Coral reefs, for instance, which are habitats for numerous species that provide food for many coastal communities, are particularly susceptible to these impacts.

“When you combine all these factors, all caused by climate change, ecosystems can and are degrading. It’s not an isolated problem; it’s multiple issues at once, though the cause is essentially the same.”

Scientists also stress that even if we stopped emitting greenhouse gases today, warming would continue for thousands of years, and sea levels would keep rising. The reason, Arias said, is that “a molecule of carbon dioxide remains in the atmosphere for about a century,” so “there’s inertia in the system.”

So, efforts must focus not only on mitigating climate change but also on adapting to new conditions.

“We must increase our capacity to coexist with the new climate reality, strengthen communities to be more resilient, and face these new realities,” said Rodney Martínez, WMO representative for North America, Central America, and the Caribbean. “We cannot sit and wait for the impacts to give us a reality check. We must design public policies that enable resource management for municipal governments, community organizations, and local actors to get involved and be part of the solution.”

According to the WMO, renewable energy capacity increased nearly 50% in 2023 compared to 2022, totaling 510 gigawatts (GW), “the highest growth rate observed in the last two decades.”

There are also successful examples of adaptation. Numerous initiatives in Latin America, thereby increasing resilience to extreme climate events.

Despite these actions, Latin America faces enormous adaptation challenges. This is well known by residents of El Bosque, who have been fighting for more than five years to be relocated, or by Clarena Fonseca, the Wayuu leader who has been measuring coastal erosion in her community with a yellow tape to gather information to mobilize authorities.

However, experts stress something fundamental. Decisions to address the crisis in one area cannot be made at the expense of destroying another. “Many times, these strategies are devised with a very short-term vision, doing something immediate without really considering the implications,” said Arias.

For example, the decision in Panama to clear a protected forest area to relocate 300 families impacted by sea-level rise worries specialists. Raisa Banfield, president of the environmental organization Sustainable Panama, believes solutions are not about “covering one mistake with another.”

This story is part of a journalistic alliance between Mongabay Latam, Vorágine, Plaza Pública, and the Centro de Periodismo Investigativo.