North Carolina passes law banning new science from guiding coastal policies

North Carolina passes law banning new science from guiding coastal policies: Apparently wanting to steer clear of fancy highbrow academic stuff like research or informed assessments, North Carolina has banned using recent science to guide policy making. House Bill 819, which passed today after the governor let the deadline to stop it slip, restricts all sea-level predictions used for policy-making to be based on "historical data," effectively sending science back to 1900. The law will prevent policy-makers from using a recent study by the state's Coastal Resources Commission (CRC) which predicted the sea level will rise by 39 inches in the next century. Developers were upset about the prediction that might cause reluctance to invest in the area.