Faced with rising waters, Singapore wants to be the pioneer of the climate fight in Asia

Published on: 08/06/2022 – 08:13 Every year, the sea rises on the coasts of Singapore, a small island state between Malaysia and Indonesia. To fight against this phenomenon linked to global warming, the government has created a special unit of around forty specialized scientists. Reportage. A very small state surrounded by seas and one of the territories most at risk from rising waters. According to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, sea levels could rise more than one meter globally by 2100 – a direct consequence of global warming. Faced with this phenomenon, Singapore, a small island state of 6 million inhabitants between Malaysia and Indonesia is on the front line. “In a scenario where CO2 emissions remain high, the water could rise by around 90cm,” says Jędrzej Majewski, a researcher at the Earth Observatory Singapore. According to these forecasts, the waters could therefore soon engulf the iconic monuments of this State largely built on the sea. Even more worrying: coupled with torrential rains during high tide, the rising waters promote another devastating phenomenon, the “sudden floods”. Walls in the sea, dams, locks… So, since 2019, to fight against rising waters, the Singaporean government has decided to make the fight against global warming one of its priorities. Its climate budget is thus estimated at 70 billion euros for the next 50 to 100 years. sea ​​level,” said Ho Chai Teck, deputy director of the Coastal Protection Department. In total, a third of the country’s land is at risk of flooding. “The different solutions we have put in place include walls in the seas, protective barriers, dams, sluices for the tides”, details t -he. The government has also raised by one meter the minimum level of the ground floor of many buildings built on the sea.