President Barack Obama used an unusually picturesque appearance at Everglades National Park on Wednesday to draw attention to an ugly problem that he said was threatening the well-being of people in south Florida and around the world: climate change.
The president appeared in rolled-up shirt sleeves at a lectern above an obscenely green sawgrass marsh to send a message that “climate change can no longer be denied” and “action can no longer be delayed”....
The White House arranged the event to mark Earth Day, the annual celebration of the planet begun in 1970. The Everglades is a 1.5m-acre estuary in southernFlorida that boasts hundreds of unique species and serves as an essential buffer and filter between inland freshwater stores and the salt waters of the Gulf Stream and ocean beyond.
The sea level is estimated to have risen a foot in south-east Florida since 1870, and is projected to come up another 9in to 2ft in the next 45 years, according to the Washington-based World Resources Institute. The drinking water of up to one-third of Floridians is threatened by encroaching seawater in the Everglades, according to White House figures.
http://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2015/apr/22/barack-obama-florida-everglades-climate-change
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