Abstract:
Sea level rise is a global phenomenon that all littoral states, including
Malaysia, need to plan for. Thus far sea level rise scenarios have been using
global data and scenarios that only depict inundation areas without taking
into account socio economic and quality of life. Malaysia is vulnerable to sea
level rise particularly areas located on the East Coast of Peninsular Malaysia
facing the South China Sea where the waves are larger, especially during
the monsoon season. It is also our study site covering over 675 km and
fifteen districts located along the coast. Models of sea level rise were
performed using three sea level rise scenarios: an increase of every 1, 2 and
3 m in areas that have been selected, including major town, industrial areas
and estuaries. To obtain a model of sea level rise, ERDAS 2011 and ArcGIS
software was used to model Interferometric Synthetic Aperture Radar
(IFSAR) data and identify the low lying inundated area. This study reveals that although sea level rise affect the coastline along the East Coast of
Peninsular Malaysia, the rise is too slow to make any impact in the near
future where by the year 2100 the rise is expected to range from 0.16 to
0.3m only. A rise of one meter in sea level, predicted to occur in the year
2319 and 2585, will only inundate 8% and 15% of Chendering and Kota
Bharu respectively. To address the problem of rising sea levels on the East
Coast of Peninsular Malaysia, this study focuses on developing vulnerability
indices on physical, socioeconomic and correlation between both
parameters.
