Nursing the Gulf Coast back to health

Nearly two years after BP’s recording-breaking oil blowout in the Gulf of Mexico, New Orleans and neighboring communities remain vulnerable to hurricanes. And Louisiana’s wetlands, which nurture the region’s $23 billion fishing industry, are in bigger trouble than ever.

Every year, the state loses up to 17 square miles of coastal wetlands. This decades-long erosion is mostly caused by channels and levees, which deprive the delta of the Mississippi River’s water and sediment. The BP disaster, which spewed more than 200 million gallons of oil into the Gulf, only worsened this ecological crisis.

Yet the very size and urgency of the Gulf’s problems have created an opportunity to fix them.

New plan provides hope for renewal

In a big step forward, the state of Louisiana has unveiled its draft 2012 Coastal Master Plan, a comprehensive vision for restoring its wetlands and protecting communities from hurricanes and flooding. The plan lays out 145 projects along 400 miles of coastline, stretching from the Chenier Plain to the Mississippi border.

Based on rigorous science and guided by a diverse team of stakeholders, the plan balances the use of natural processes to rebuild wetlands with traditional engineering and flood protection projects, including levee construction and home elevation.

A 35-year mission in the Gulf

EDF senior counsel Jim Tripp and our coalition partners played a major role in developing the plan. In particular, they provided a strong voice in favor of using the natural dynamics of the Mississippi to repair and sustain cypress swamps, coastal marshes and barrier islands.

EDF coastal scientist Dr. Angelina Freeman works on rebuilding wetlands by reconnecting the Mississippi to its natural floodplain.

Photo by: Yuki Kokubo.

Destruction of the Mississippi River Delta is “by far the largest and most tragic loss of ecological resources in this country,” says Tripp, who has worked since 1973 to preserve Louisiana wetlands. He is a longtime member of the Louisiana Governor’s Advisory Commission on Coastal Protection, Restoration and Conservation.

The coastal plan proposes six large sediment diversion projects for rebuilding wetlands south of New Orleans. One of them is the Myrtle Grove project in northern Barataria Bay,  an area losing land at one of the highest rates in Louisiana.

Here, EDF’s coastal scientist, Dr. Angelina Freeman, co-managed a team of scientists and engineers that developed models showing how reconnecting the Mississippi River to its natural floodplain would rebuild wetlands.

The Army Corps of Engineers is now using the results in its feasibility study. Exploiting the natural energy of the river to build land lasts longer than pumping and dredging, which is also more expensive.

Saving fisheries, alligators and wading birds

“Louisiana’s plan reflects the science behind projects that harness natural deltaic processes,” says Dr. Freeman.

Restoring wetlands protects coastal communities as well as threatened species like this Louisiana black bear cub.

Photo credit: Lockwood/Animals Animals

Projects such as Myrtle Grove, she notes, will benefit the ecosystem and help sustain alligators and waterfowl like the roseate spoonbill.

The plan–which must go through a review process and get approval from the Louisiana legislature– would create nearly 860 square miles of wetlands over 50 years and save $18 billion in annual flood damage. Without action, the land loss experienced since the 1930s would double over the next 50 years, to nearly 4,000 square miles.

Plan calls for $50 billion investment

Making this vision a reality hinges on funding. The plan calls for a $50 billion investment, a high hurdle for a partisan Congress in an election year.

Some money will come from a 2011 agreement among the federal government, the Gulf States and BP, under which the oil company pledged a $1 billion down payment for the cost of repairing natural resources damaged by the spill.  But that’s just a start.

RESTORE Act is critical source of funding

Additional funding could come from Clean Water Act fines arising from the disaster, which could top $20 billion. EDF and our coalition partners have been working to ensure that most of the oil spill penalties be directed to gulf states.

To achieve that goal, EDF helped shape the language of a bill in the Senate, called the RESTORE the Gulf Coast States Act, which would dedicate 80% of the fines for ecosystem restoration and economic recovery to Alabama, Florida, Louisiana, Mississippi and Texas.

In a landmark bipartisan vote, the Senate recently supported the RESTORE Act, by a margin of 76 to 22, as an amendment to the Senate transportation bill. The House recently approved a similar bill.

Without the RESTORE Act, those monies would otherwise be deposited into the Oil Spill Liability Trust Fund, to cover future spills, and into the Federal Treasury.

“This is absolutely historic for the recovery of Gulf Coast communities, and in particular Louisiana’s vanishing wetlands,” says Tripp.