Pacific coral islands defy sea-level rise

New Scientist : Despite rising sea levels due to global warming, atolls in the Pacific Ocean do not appear to be in any danger of disappearing. Rather, some of them are actually getting bigger. Paul Kench of the University of Auckland, New Zealand, and his colleagues studied more than 100 years of data taken at 29 islands of Funafuti. Although the atoll has experienced some of the highest rates of sea-level rise, the researchers have found that no islands have disappeared, a majority have grown in size, and the net island area has increased by 7.3%. According to Kench, the islands get bigger as storms break up coral reefs and deposit the material on their shores. Hence storm activity is more important than sea-level rise to the stability of the atolls. The team’s findings, however, do not apply to other types of island, such as the volcanic islands of Fiji and Samoa.