Thai expert fights to save temple from sea

BANGKOK, Oct 3 (Reuters) - For years, the monks of Wat Khun Samutchine have fought a desperate battle to save their Buddhist temple from being swallowed by the Gulf of Thailand.

Now, a Thai geologist believes he has the answer to saving the temple and helping others defend against rising sea levels and stronger storms that could drown low-lying areas across Asia.

"We have to prepare for our future and convince policy makers that this is a priority," Thanawat Jaruponsakul, a geology professor at Bangkok's Chulalongkorn University, told Reuters in an interview.

Thanawat is testing a new type of sea barrier at the temple, surrounded on all sides by waters from the Gulf of Thailand, where 485 km (300 miles) of coastline is severely eroded.

Rising water levels have forced the 200 families in the village of Samutchine to abandon their homes several times over the past decade and finally move inland.

Their only link to the temple is a series of narrow wooden and concrete bridges.

"There used to be a village here, but the water and the waves are just rising and the villagers could not stay. They had to move away," monk Somnuek Atipinyo told Reuters Television in May.

Scientists say human-induced global warming is causing rising sea levels that could hit hard in Asia, where vast numbers of people live in low-lying costal areas and even threaten huge cities such as Bangkok.

Unable to afford Dutch-style dykes or other expensive flood-control systems, most Asian nations do not have detailed plans to deal with the threat.

But Thanawat believes he has found an affordable and practical way to reclaim land from the sea.

His pilot project began in April with the sinking of three rows of 10-metre (33 ft) long, triangular concrete poles into the seabed near the temple.

Set about 1.5 meters (5 ft) apart, Thanawat said the shock-absorbent poles -- or Disintegrated Wave-Power Barrier which he plans to patent -- could reduce wave energy by up to 30 percent.

Tests have not been completed yet, but anecdotal evidence suggests the barrier is working.

"The people say they can see a difference when big waves hit the area," said Thanawat, who blames the problem on dramatic changes in the direction and intensity of seasonal monsoons.

According to his research, the size of waves during the monsoon seasons in the Gulf of Thailand and Andaman Sea have mostly doubled over the last decade.

"I think this phenomenon is related to global warming. It has made it stronger," he said.

Thanawat, who will publish a book on the threat of global warming to Thailand next month, hoped his research at Samutchine would spur governments to act.

"We need a master plan to save our coastlines," he said.