PORTLAND PRESS HERALD • October 22, 2025
When Jim Shafer and Carol Epstein moved into their South Portland home more than 10 years ago, they weren’t thinking about how climate change would directly impact them. “What the storms of January 2024 said to us and to many others is that the impacts of this are happening now,” Epstein said. “It brought an immediacy to it.” By next spring, their first floor will be elevated by 5 feet — the product of more than a year of permitting, planning and construction, the project is estimated to cost $500,000. The sea level in Maine is projected to rise between 1.1 and 3.2 feet by 2050 and 3 and 9.3 feet by 2100, increasing the risks — and impacts — of coastal flooding. Epstein and Shafer might be among the first South Portland residents to elevate their home in response to the rising risk of coastal flooding, but their neighbors are eagerly watching the progress and monitoring results. Elsewhere along Maine’s coast, homeowners have been elevating their homes for years.