Summer Quarterly 2018
Nuclear Shorts
A revised Pentagon report on the effects of climate change on US defense infrastructure removed all but one reference to climate change. The January 2018 report, “Department of Defense Climate-Related Risk to DoD Infrastructure: Initial Screening Level Vulnerability Assessment Survey” (SLVAS), was supposed to outline the threats posed by climate change to military bases, ports and outposts. But the revised report kept only one reference to climate change out of the original report’s 23. The revision also removed a critical map showing military sites that are vulnerable to sea level rise. Rising seas are especially threatening to Naval Station Norfolk, in Virginia, which floods frequently, and to a multi-billion dollar anti-ballistic missile test site in the Marshall Islands. The report also deleted its prior admission that high heat days will have an effect on training. —Sources: Weather.com, May 11, 2018; and DoD Office of Economic Adjustment’s SLVAS, Feb. 23, 2018
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