Dear Ms. Hann and Colleagues:

Many of the issues Ms. Hann raises were addressed by Eric Bird and Victor
Prescott in "Rising Global Sea Levels and National Maritime Claims," _Marine
Policy Reports_, vol. 1 (1989): 177-196.  I would recommend this piece and
note three things.

Sea level rise, though disastrous, will be gradual.  The effect is not
significantly different from erosion or accretion for maritime
jurisdiction—just generally trending in one direction (erosion).  The gradual
nature of sea-level rise should allow countries to take measures to preserve
salient features of their coastlines or islands. Leaving aside the issue of
whether Okinotorishma is an island or rock in terms of the 1982 UN Convention
on the Law of the Sea, the extraordinary measures Japan has taken to
"enhance" this feature and preserve it shows what is possible.

I had the fortune (good or ill) to be an alternate member of the US Baseline
Committee for several years. That interagency committee determined the
location of the US territorial sea, contiguous zone, and EEZ.  We revised
these boundaries with each new NOAA chart.  Although a change in the
low-water line, which is the baseline used by the US government, frequently
had a significant effect on the limit of the territorial sea, the same
accretion and erosion often barely affected the outer limit of the EEZ.  In
part, this is due to scale.  A reduction of one-half kilometer in a salient
coastal point has a marked effect on a 12-nautical mile territorial sea, but
is less noticeable over 350 nm.  More importantly, many coastal points
influence the outer limit of the territorial sea; relatively few influence
the outer limit of the EEZ.  If a country were determined to preserve its
EEZ, it would need to protect relatively few salient points from the effects
of sea-level rise.

Regression of the coastline is addressed in the 1982 UN Convention for
straight baselines along unstable coasts (Art. 7).  "[T]he appropriate points
may be selected along the furthest seaward extent of the low-water line and,
notwithstanding subsequent regression of the low-water line, the straight
baselines shall remain effective until changed by the coastal State in
accordance with this Convention."  However, I do not see anything in the
Convention that requires the coastal state to revise the baselines once
promulgated, and it may chose not to do so.  Similarly, there is nothing in
the Convention to require an archipelagic state to revise archipelagic
baselines once they are drawn, even if some of the basepoints subsequently
become submerged.  Finally, several countries (Haiti, Malaysia, and North
Korea) have promulgated the outer limits of their EEZs without specifying how
they arrived at those limits, though an implicit system of straight baselines
if obvious.  It appears that only countries which use the low-water line as
their baseline will be troubled by a rising sea.

Regards,
Dan Dzurek