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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.

A City That Is Already Gone

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."