Doomstead

THEGUARDIAN.COM • 2026-05-04

‘Point of no return’: New Orleans relocation must start now due to sea level, study finds

Louisiana’s cultural hotspot could be surrounded by the Gulf of Mexico before the end of this century.

QuoteA City That Is Already Gone (https://substack.com/home/post/p-200633238)

Start with New Orleans. A new study published in Nature Sustainability has concluded what many scientists have known for years: the city has passed its point of no return. Southern Louisiana faces three to seven metres of sea-level rise. Three-quarters of its remaining coastal wetlands will disappear. The shoreline will migrate a hundred kilometres inland. New Orleans — a city of 360,000 people — will be surrounded by the Gulf of Mexico before the end of this century.

The researcher Jesse Keenan, a climate adaptation expert at Tulane University, put it without euphemism: "New Orleans is in a terminal condition, and we need to be clear with the patient that it is terminal."