U.S. ports along the East and Gulf Coasts are familiar with the yearly onslaught of storms and flooding brought on by hurricane season between June and November. But, as climate change conditions have pushed up sea levels and brought more intense hurricanes to bear, the challenges ports are facing are only going to get more complex and costly.

Those challenges have already been observable in 2024, with Tropical Storm Alberto bringing nearly a foot of rain to parts of Texas and Mexico in June, while temporarily shutting down five ports in Northeast Mexico. A month later, four Gulf Coast ports in Texas were forced to close by Hurricane Beryl, the earliest category-5 Atlantic hurricane on record, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). Then in August, Hurricane Debby shut down ports in Georgia and Florida, while causing an estimated $28 billion worth of damage and economic loss across the eastern seaboard, according to AccuWeather. In its mid-season forecast released on August 8, NOAA predicted that by the end of November, this year's hurricane season "could rank among the busiest on record."

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In the years to come, the biggest concern for ports will be more about the rising intensity than the frequency of hurricanes and storms, says AccuWeather senior meteorologist and climate expert Brett Anderson. 

"Storms that do form will have the potential to become extreme, major hurricanes, and that's the bigger risk we are seeing," he says. "For storms that do impact the East Coast or Gulf Coast, that potential for major damaging hurricanes has increased, and we think that will continue." 

Anderson points to climate change as the main culprit for this shift, bringing more heat in the atmosphere, higher levels of water vapor, and more extreme, prolonged rainfall along coastlines, where sea levels have already been steadily rising for the better part of the last half-century. With higher sea levels, even a weak storm can cause significant flooding problems at ports, Anderson says.

A 2017 study from the University of Rhode Island's Department of Marine Affairs warned that 100 of the country's major commercial coastal ports will eventually need "major modifications" to protect against rising waters, while requiring an investment in material and financial resources on a scale not seen in the past. In total, the study estimates that it will take $57-78 billion and 704 million cubic meters of concrete fill to elevate those major ports by two meters. Elevating East Coast ports alone would cost between $19.5 billion and $26.6 billion. And if ports are slow to make those improvements, the consequences could be dire.

"Without infrastructure investments in port preparedness for flooding, operational impacts are likely to continue disrupting maritime freight during peak storm season," says Jena Santoro, a senior manager with supply chain risk management company Everstream Analytics. 

That said, several U.S. ports have also already started preparing for the coming storms, Santoro adds. She describes how many have looked into a range of improvements, from a series of flood barriers proposed for New York Harbor in 2022, to a large concrete cistern the Port of Baltimore built in 2019 to collect and store excess rainwater. At the federal level, the Biden administration set aside $653 million in November 2023, to fund a series of projects to raise elevations at select ports, and strengthen shipping berths against hurricane conditions. 

Ultimately, Anderson says that it will take "good decision-makers and better infrastructure" to keep ports above water. 

"It's going to cost money as well," he says. "Those problems have started, and they're going to continue to grow — we definitely need to be proactive and prepare for the future."