Chapter 27 Paros Island (Cyclades, Aegean Sea) Coastal Zone: Natural Processes and Dynamics N. Evelpidou, S.E. Poulos, and A. Vassilopoulos Abstract The present contribution deals with the natural environment of Paros island coastal zone. More than 75% of the coastal zone consists of high and lower cliffs, whilst the relatively ﬂat coastal plains are rare. The island receives a substantial amount of wave energy ﬂux. The largest rocky and of high slopes coastal part is situated at the northeast and northwest part of the island being developed on hard (resistant to weathering processes) metamorphic rocks. Costal plains (slopes < 2.5%) have been formed on Quaternary clastic formations. Fur- thermore, sandy and/or pebbly beach zones have been formed by the deposition of terrigenous (mainly) and marine sediments, along relatively sheltered from the wave activity parts of the coastline, i.e. the bays of Drios, Kephalos, Plastiras, Piso Livadi and Alikes. Palaeogeographic reconstruction with respect to sea-level rise within Holocene reveals that Paros island, at 10,000 yr BP, was much larger (some 1,025 km 2 ) combined with the islands of Antiparos, Naxos and several islets, while at 6,000 yr BP was only connected to Antiparos island covering 264.3 km 2 . Finally, the predicted ca. 0.5 m of sea level rise for the year 2100, due to climatic change, will deﬁnitely threaten the socio-economy of the island as all touristic beaches will be deteriorated as well as several constructions along its coastline. Keywords Paros Island · Coastal geomorphology · Tourist beaches · Sea-level change 27.1 Introduction Coastal areas in Greece as well as islands have signiﬁcant environmental values, which can be the basis for economic development and, consequently, of a high quality of life for the inhabitants. The 1/3 of the population of Greece lives no N. Evelpidou (B ) Department of Geography and Climatology, Faculty of Geology & Geoenvironment, University of Athens, Panepistimiopolis, Zografou 157 84, Athens, Greece e-mail: evelpidou@geol.uoa.gr 285 D.R. Green (ed.), Coastal and Marine Geospatial Technologies, Coastal Systems and Continental Margins 13, DOI 10.1007/978-1-4020-9720-1_27, C  Springer Science+Business Media B.V. 2010