VULNERABILITY OF SELECT INDIAN COASTAL REGIONS TO CLIMATE CHANGE

participantIndia has a coastline of about 7516 km and has a population density of 324 per sq.km. Indian coast is highly vulnerable to natural disasters like cyclones, strom surges, tsunami, coastal erosion and sea level rise. Therefore, coastal geomorphology is continuously altered by the natural processes as well as anthropogenic activites. In the present work, impacts of mean sea level rise and changes in the extreme sea level were carried out at three regions along the Indian coast. The regions selected have typical topographic variations. These regions experienced the impact of Tsunami and storm surges in the past. This study is carried out at different types of Indian coast. The probable inundation limits are estimated for two sea level rise scenorios. Land use/landcover maps and digital elevation model(DEM) were used to derive inundation areas. The results show that the areas likely to be lost to a sea level rise of 1m and 2m respectively . It is 4.2 km2 and 42.5 km2 at Nagapattinam (southeast coast of India ), 169 km2 and 599 km2 at Kochi (southwest coast of India ) and 478 km2 and 1128 km2 at Paradip (central east coast of India). As this study reveals the extent of inundation, it helps to develop adaptation and mitigation measures in those areas for sea level rise problems and occurrence of storm surges along the Indian coast