Natural Hazards Research Summit 2022: Social and Economic Disparity in Isolation Risk due to Sea Level Rise in the United States

In this work, we examine community isolation due to SLR in which isolated census blocks refer to those without an available route to schools and emergency services. By combining estimates of isolation with socio-demographic data, we examine social and economic disparities under various relative SLR scenarios (1-10 ft) across the coastal United States. We find that communities with older adults and higher rates of minority populations face a disproportionately higher risk of isolation, particularly Black and Hispanic populations. Areas with higher rates of renters are at higher risk of isolation. These results highlight a previously unidentified concern for community vulnerability to SLR and allow us to identify populations at risk that would be missing from analyses dependent on just inundation measures, namely young, higher-income renters. This nuance raises new questions about the impacts of SLR on community well-being with significant implications for justice in climate adaptation and infrastructure development.