Shanghai could be underwater by 2100
Get your goggles ready and dig out that two-piece you've been stashing in the back of your closet: one day you might find yourself swimming down Huaihai Lu, as Shanghai is projected to be completely underwater by 2100 if global temperatures rise by 3 degrees Celcius, according to a report by The Guardian.
The average elevation of Shanghai is only four metres, about the height of two Donald Trumps stacked on top of each other if they managed to cooperate long enough to do that. Although some places like The Bund have been elevated in recent years to combat potential water rise and an enormous deepwater drainage system has been installed throughout the city, they might not be enough to fend off climate change. The threshold temperature rise of 3 degrees Celcius is arbitrary, recent floods in cities like New York, Houston and Mumbai have shown that such events are already happening and can occur unexpectedly.
Other highly flood-prone cities include Osaka, Miami and Rio de Janeiro, but in terms of people affected, Shanghai dwarfs them all with more than 17.5 million residents who could fall victim to the rising sea levels.
If there's any bright side to these dour predictions (there probably isn't), it's that China's sharing economy may benefit from the rising sea levels. Moboat or Aqua Didi, anyone?
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