The research, carried out by experts from the National Institute of Geophysics and Volcanology (INGV), pointed out that the tide level in the Venetian lagoon rises at a rate of half a centimeter each year, ranging from 4.22 millimeters at Lido and 4.38 at Punta della Salute to 5.0 at Malamocco and 5.91 at Chioggia.

The analysis, published on the INGV’s official website, is based on statistics from the municipality’s tidal center, collected over the last twenty years, and compared with satellite data on vertical ground movements due to subsidence, collected between 2008 and 2023.

Estimates indicate that in about 125 years, Piazza San Marco will be permanently submerged under some 70 centimeters of water, and the same will happen to parts of the western area of that city, a situation that is aggravated by an increase in the frequency of floods, even above 110 centimeters, with 58 occurring between 2019 and 2023.

“Sea level increase, particularly if accelerated locally by subsidence, is leading to increasingly severe and widespread coastal erosion, beach retreat and marine flooding with very significant environmental and socioeconomic impacts for populations,” INGV researcher Marco Anzidei said.

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