UN Secretary-General António Guterres sounded the alarm during his visit to Tonga, issuing a dire warning about the catastrophic impact of rising sea levels on Pacific Island nations and the world at large.
“I am in Tonga to issue a global SOS—Save Our Seas—on rising sea levels,” Guterres declared “A worldwide catastrophe is putting this Pacific paradise in peril,” Guterres said Tuesday at the sidelines of the Pacific Islands Forum Leaders Meeting in Nuku’alofa.
Guterres highlighted that global sea levels are rising at rates unprecedented in the past 3,000 years, with the Pacific region witnessing some of the most severe impacts.
“The ocean is overflowing,” he said, that the changes in the Pacific since his last visit are stark and deeply concerning.
The Secretary-General cited two new UN reports that highlight the urgency of the situation. The World Meteorological Organisation’s report on the State of the Climate in the South West Pacific and the UN Climate Action Team’s summary on surging seas paint a grim picture.
The report found that sea level lapping against Tonga’s capital Nuku’alofa had risen 21 centimetres between 1990 and 2020, twice the global average of 10 centimetres. Apia, Samoa, has seen 31 centimetres of rising seas, while Suva, Fiji has had 29 centimetres.
Since 1980, coastal flooding in Guam has jumped from twice a year to 22 times a year. It’s gone from five times a year to 43 times a year in the Cook Islands. In Pago Pago, American Samoa, coastal flooding went from zero to 102 times a year, according to the WMO State of the Climate in the South-West Pacific 2023 report.
“These reports show that changes to the ocean are accelerating, with devastating impacts,” Guterres said.
According to the reports, relative sea levels in the Southwestern Pacific have risen more than double the global average in some locations over the past 30 years. Ocean temperatures in the region are also increasing at up to three times the global rate.
“This is a region with an average elevation just one to two meters above sea level,” Guterres explained.
“Around 90 percent of people live within 5 kilometers of the coast, and half the infrastructure is within 500 meters of the sea.”
The implications of these changes are dire. “Without drastic cuts to emissions, the Pacific Islands can expect at least 15 centimeters of additional sea level rise by mid-century and more than 30 days per year of coastal flooding in some places,” Guterres warned.
He described the potential devastation, from ruined fisheries and contaminated freshwater supplies to the destruction of entire coastal communities.
Guterres pointed to the primary culprit: greenhouse gases generated by the burning of fossil fuels.
“The reason is clear: greenhouse gases are cooking our planet, and the sea is taking the heat—literally,” he said.
He explained that the ocean has absorbed more than 90 percent of global heating over the past 50 years, leading to thermal expansion and the melting of glaciers and ice sheets, which further contribute to rising sea levels.
The Secretary-General did not mince words about the future risks.
He highlighted emerging science suggesting that a two-degree Celsius rise in global temperatures could lead to the near-complete loss of the Greenland ice sheet and much of the West Antarctic ice sheet.
“That would mean condemning future generations to unstoppable sea level rise of up to 20 meters—over millennia,” he cautioned. If global temperatures rise by three degrees, which is the current trajectory, the rise in sea level would occur much more quickly, devastating coastal communities worldwide.
Guterres emphasised that the crisis is not limited to the Pacific.
“Surging seas are coming for us all,” he said, listing coastal megacities like Dhaka, Los Angeles, Mumbai, Lagos, and Shanghai among those threatened by swelling oceans.
He warned that if global temperatures rise by 2.5 degrees, the frequency of extreme coastal flooding could increase from once in 100 years to once every five years by the end of the century.
“Can you imagine the impact on this beautiful capital city of Nuku’alofa?
“But what happens in Tonga did not start in Tonga, and it doesn’t end here. Surging seas are coming for us all – together with the devastation of fishing, tourism, and the Blue Economy.
The economic implications are staggering. Guterres noted that without new adaptation and protection measures, economic damage from coastal flooding could reach trillions of dollars.
“Around 1 metre of future sea level rise is already locked in,” he said. “But its future scale, pace, and impact depend on decisions we take now.”
Guterres called on global leaders to step up and take immediate action.
He urged them to drastically slash emissions, lead a fast and fair phase-out of fossil fuels, and massively boost climate adaptation investments.
“Only by limiting warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius do we have a fighting chance of preventing the irreversible collapse of the Greenland and West Antarctic ice sheets,” he said.
To achieve this, Guterres called for governments to deliver on their promises made at COP28, including new national climate action plans by next year that align with the 1.5-degree limit and cover all emissions and the whole economy.
He emphasised the need to phase out fossil fuels rapidly, end new coal projects, and halt the expansion of oil and gas.
He also called on the G20—the world’s biggest emitters with the greatest capacity and responsibility to lead—to be at the forefront of these efforts.
“We need a surge in funds to deal with surging seas,” he said, calling for significant contributions to the new Loss and Damage Fund to support vulnerable countries like those in the Pacific Islands.
“At COP29, countries must agree to boost innovative financing and a strong new finance goal. Developed countries must deliver on their finance commitments – including the commitment to double adaptation finance to at least US$40 billion a year by 2025,” he said.
Guterres stressed the importance of protecting every person on Earth with an early warning system by 2027, which would involve building up countries’ data capacities to improve decision-making on adaptation and coastal planning.
“The world must look to the Pacific and listen to the science,” Guterres urged.
“Rising seas are a crisis entirely of humanity’s making—a crisis that will soon swell to an almost unimaginable scale, with no lifeboat to take us back to safety.”
He concluded with a powerful message: “But if we save the Pacific, we also save ourselves. The world must act and answer the SOS before it is too late, said Guterres.
