Obama Talks Climate Change at Coast Guard Academy

President Obama will use his commencement address at the Coast Guard Academy this morning to renew his call to treat climate change as a "serious threat to global security."

At his speech in New London, Connecticut, Obama will point to sea-level rise that is already taking place. "In Miami and Charleston, streets now flood at high tide. Along our coasts, thousands of miles of highways, roads, railways, and energy facilities are vulnerable," Obama will say, according to excerpts released by the White House. "It's estimated that a further increase in sea level of one foot—just one foot—by the end of this century could cost our nation $200 billion."

The White House also is releasing a new report that draws from a series of Defense Department analyses about how rising sea levels and climbing average temperatures will affect both the United States and other countries. "Climate change will change the nature of U.S. military missions, demand more resources in the Arctic and other coastal regions vulnerable to rising sea levels, and other impacts, and require a multilateral response to the growing humanitarian crises that climate change is predicted to bring," the report concludes.

The overwhelming majority of researchers attribute climate change to higher concentrations of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases in the atmosphere from the burning of fossil fuels. Many Republicans, though, say there is no proof that humans are the primary cause of climate change and have opposed Obama's efforts to tighten regulations on power plants to reduce carbon emissions.

The Environmental Protection Agency is planning to release final regulations for the nation's fleet of power plants this summer.