Category Archives: Guest Post

Profiles in Resilience: DSC Dredge

By | Bio | Published: April 30, 2012

by Shawn Stokes

 

While doing research for a Duke University study on jobs in Gulf Coast restoration, I met an affable entrepreneur named Robert “Bob” Wetta. He is the president of DSC Dredge, a small business founded by his father in the early 1990s. DSC Dredge manufactures portable hydraulic dredges for use in mining, navigation, and environmental restoration. The family-owned firm has over 100 employees, who work on the design, construction, and servicing of dredging equipment at DSC’s facilities in Reserve, La., a St. John the Baptist Parish community near the western edge of the New Orleans metropolitan area.

As a native Louisianan, Wetta is all too familiar with the precarious state of the Gulf Coast’s wetlands, and knows how important the strategic placement of sediment by comparatively nimble portable dredges can be when confronting local issues like sea level rise, subsidence in the Mississippi River Delta, and the aftermath of the 2010 oil spill. However, his view of vulnerability and corporate response extends far beyond the southeastern section of the Bayou State. Indeed, DSC’s president is increasingly setting his sights on similar risks of flooding and land loss in another region known for its densely settled coastal plains, verdant deltas, and periodic tropical storm landings — South and Southeast Asia.

“About half of all Americans  – more than 150 million people — live in counties bordering the Atlantic Ocean, the Pacific Ocean, and the Gulf of Mexico, and in many of these areas, restoration of coastal wetlands could enhance natural and artificial defenses for flood protection,” says Mr. Wetta. “When you then think about how important the issue of flood resilience is for a nation like Bangladesh, where that same number of people is crowded into a small, flat country smack in the path of cyclones, you start to see why dredgers could play a significant role in saving a city like Dhaka from disaster.”

(Click to see global view) The map above shows indexed sea level rise risks for the coastal regions of countries in South Asia (left panel) and Southeast Asia (right panel). Red and brown shading indicates countries that face the most severe risks from this environmental threat, due to the heavy concentration of cities and population centers in vulnerable areas within their borders. (Source: Center for Global Development)

In response to sea level rise, Asian countries like India, Cambodia , Indonesia and Vietnam are developing their own integrated coastal restoration programs that incorporate heavy construction along with natural flood protection measures such as shoreline mangrove swamps and restored coastal wetlands. Since these countries will need portable dredges to carry out much of the work, this presents a terrific opportunity for Wetta’s business to expand its footprint in an export market with tremendous growth potential.

A DSC "Shark" class dredge at work on a coastal restoration project (Source: DSC Dredge)

He explained to me that in order for manufacturing companies like his to be competitive in the global market, they need to innovate, which often requires substantial capital investment in research and development. But companies are often wary of committing resources to innovation unless there is sufficient product demand to help them recoup their investment. Wetta wishes that more interest in restoration investment could come from U.S. stakeholders, explaining, “For dredge manufacturing firms like ours, we know that more of our demand could come from public works projects like coastal restoration here in America.  Unfortunately, public funding for such projects is sporadic and sometimes falls short of what is needed. By comparison, there are other countries that have established dedicated funding streams to commit much more to their coasts.”

For example, the Netherlands, whose area is roughly twice that of the state of New Jersey, invests about 0.1% of its annual gross domestic product (GDP) (550 million Euros, or $732 million, at an exchange rate of US $1.33 = €1) in coastal restoration and flood protection. This funding provides a huge incentive for private firms in the low-lying country to focus on these sectors and become market leaders. If the United States were to spend a similar proportion of its GDP on protecting thickly-settled coastlines and river valleys from ecosystem damage and floods, we would be seeing investment to the tune of $13 – $15 billion dollars each year in dredging, site redesign, and other facets of wetland restoration and resilience enhancements.

Committing more resources to ecosystem restoration would give firms like DSC Dredge the confidence to invest in the innovations necessary to maintain their global competitiveness. Securing this investment in the Gulf Coast’s wetlands would not only help that region’s businesses, but could also make the United States as a whole a leader in the coastal restoration and management industry —  a sector that will only grow bigger in a wetter and warmer world.

 

Shawn Stokes is a research analyst at the Center on Globalization, Governance, and Competitiveness at Duke University. Prior to joining the CGGC, Shawn worked as a data analyst at FINCA International, served as a Peace Corps volunteer in Ecuador, and conducted policy analysis for USAID Panama.  His current work focuses on food, agriculture and environmental global value chains, including a series on coastal restoration and management along the Gulf Coast.

 

 

Related Links

Asia and its floods: Save our cities [The Economist]

Changes in wetlands in Dhaka City: Trends and physico-environmental consequences [Journal of Life and Earth Science (Bangladesh)]

Climate and Society column (Restoration and Resilience): What the Gulf Coast could share with Guatemala on storm resilience [Part I], [Part II], [Part III]

Profiles in resilience: Restoration Systems [Restoration and Resilience]

Profiles in restoration: The Central Wetlands Unit, Part II [Restoration and Resilience]

Task force: Restoring sediment key to Gulf revival [Bloomberg Businessweek]

Also posted in Green Jobs, International, Profiles in Resilience, Regional Economic Development, Trade, Water, Wetlands | Leave a comment

20th century industries provide 21st century solutions to restore the Gulf Coast and Mississippi River Delta

By | Bio | Published: March 7, 2012

by Shawn Stokes

 

While the global financial crisis has taken a toll on almost every industry, it has affected some more than others. The recession hit the construction equipment manufacturing sector particularly hard, causing an industry loss of 30 to 50 percent between 2008 and 2009. It should not be surprising, then, to find that equipment manufacturers are looking for new opportunities to build revenue. What most people may not realize is that these firms are discovering such opportunities in restoration work, particularly in the Mississippi River Delta and other areas along the Gulf Coast.

As part of our research for a Duke University study on Gulf Coast restoration, we met the founders of several small, family-owned businesses, including Marsh Buggies, Inc. and Wilco Manufacturing. These two companies manufacture marsh buggies and cargo buggies – amphibious transport and excavating machines designed specifically for wetland environments like coastal Louisiana. Originally developed to dig trenches in the marsh, they played an integral role during the post-World War II construction boom for oil and gas pipelines. Marsh Buggies, Inc. and Wilco Manufacturing provided the machines and the trench digging services necessary to put the pipelines in place.

A marsh buggy (above left) manufactured by Wilco Manufacturing, LLC and a cargo buggy (above right) by Marsh Buggies, Inc. (Sources: Marsh Buggies, Inc.; Wilco Manufacturing, LLC)

After almost three decades of blistering growth, U.S. oil production slowed substantially during the 1970s, and in the years that followed, pipeline construction and repair work declined as well. In search of other applications for their equipment and services, the owners of trench digging companies found that their marsh buggies were also ideally suited to the work of restoring wetlands. These firms now serve a growing share of customers involved in coastal restoration.

Marsh buggies are used to build rock walls to control erosion, tear down levees to divert sediment, construct terraces to protect barrier islands, assemble dikes to contain sediment for marsh creation and move existing oil and gas pipelines. Cargo buggies transport materials to project sites and carry equipment, including soil boring tools used by geological teams during project design and evaluation. Since the financial crisis, this work has become vitally important, at times representing up to 25% of these firms’ construction services.

Throughout our research, we learned that these stories are not unique. Many of the businesses hit hardest by the financial crisis are those that were established to support growth industries of the 20th century – extractive industries, shipbuilding and industrial civil construction. Firms in each of these sectors have the capacity and capabilities to diversify and provide 21st century solutions to help restore the Gulf Coast and Mississippi River Delta. Interviews with industry leaders consistently revealed that coastal restoration presents an opportunity to grow an important segment of their industry at a time when their traditional markets are declining or undependable. Increased funding streams for Gulf Coast environmental restoration – such as the RESTORE Act – would also benefit these companies and encourage job growth.

Our research concluded that restoring coastal wetlands can provide an alternative for well-established firms, including many small businesses, to save and create jobs by diversifying into an activity that protects the environment, benefits other industries, and represents a critical investment in the future.

Shawn Stokes is a research analyst at the Center on Globalization, Governance, and Competitiveness at Duke University. Prior to joining the CGGC, Shawn worked as a data analyst at FINCA International, served as a Peace Corps volunteer in Ecuador, and conducted policy analysis for USAID Panama.  His current work focuses on food, agriculture and environmental global value chains, including a series on coastal restoration and management along the Gulf Coast.

 

 

Related Links

RESTORE Act fines could provide job opportunities in Gulf Coast, 32 other states [Delta Dispatches]

Restoring the Gulf Coast: New Markets for Established Firms [Duke University Center on Globalization, Governance, and Competitiveness]

The big footprint of small business in Gulf Coast restoration [Restoration and Resilience]

Who pays to repair Louisiana’s wetlands? [National Public Radio]

Also posted in Green Jobs, Profiles in Resilience, Targeted Jobs, Wetlands | Leave a comment

Eleven from ‘11

By | Bio | Published: January 6, 2012

Happy New Year! We’re excited for 2012, but we wanted to take a moment to present some posts from the previous year that we thought would be worth revisiting before starting on a new year of blogging about the Mississippi River Delta and the greater Gulf Coast.

 

  1. We discussed the socioeconomic consequences of disasters on wetland communities, often through the lens of demographic changes. In a January 2011 post, we examined some of the factors behind the dramatic drop in New Orleans’ population after the floods and hurricanes of 2005
  2. On the first anniversary of the Deepwater Horizon explosion, we looked at some of the economic effects of the 2010 BP oil disaster on coastal Louisiana’s workforce.
  3. Later in 2011, we broadened our focus beyond the Delta to see how jobless rates stood in metropolitan areas ringing the Gulf that had been affected by the global recession and the 2010 spill.
  4. Aside from statistics, we also delved into policy, especially with regards to congressional action on ecosystem restoration and hazard mitigation funding. In a post last February, we looked at why the Oil Spill Commission’s recommendations for environmental work could translate into a jobs program for spill-affected regions like Plaquemines Parish.
  5. In March, a guest blogger from The Wilderness Society looked at how congressional budget cuts could impact small-scale restoration efforts in Louisiana.
  6. Later in the year, we considered whether a greater emphasis on resiliency measures could have improved the prospects of a construction bill in the House of Representatives.
  7. We also thought about ways to boost labor participation and public involvement in ecosystem regeneration. In a June 2011 post, we looked at some of the “dirty jobs” (Discovery Channel definition) that are integral to wetland rehabilitation.
  8. Several weeks later, we thought about how coastal Louisiana’s schools could better prepare their students for the challenging (and potentially lucrative) job opportunities afforded by expansion of the restoration sector.
  9. We even went the whimsical route by blogging about potential ways that discarded Christmas trees could be repurposed for coastal restoration in a three-part series that we published last January.
  10. We also considered the foreign markets that might be hungry for the hazard mitigation and habitat rehabilitation tools that are being developed by researchers and companies based in the Mississippi River Delta. In a set of three posts by a researcher from Columbia’s Earth Institute, we looked at the devastating effects of tropical storms on Guatemala’s urban centers and its rural communities, and discussed cross-border collaboration between the Gulf Coast and Guatemala to improve resilience and forge new business ties.
  11. Near the end of the year, our sister blog, Delta Dispatches, migrated to its new home at www.mississippiriverdelta.org, a site chronicling our work with other nonprofits to restore coastal Louisiana. As 2012 progresses, the new site will include more great features, as well as updates about efforts to pass legislation committing BP’s oil spill fines to wetland rehabilitation and environmental protection.

 

 

Related Links

Climate and Society Column: What the Gulf Coast Could Share with Guatemala on Storm Resilience [Part I], [Part II], [Part III]

Gifts That Keep On Giving: How Christmas Trees Could Curb Erosion in Coastal Louisiana [Part I], [Part II], [Part III]

Also posted in Events, Wetlands | Leave a comment

What the Conservation Economy Means for the Mississippi River Delta

By | Bio | Published: October 3, 2011

The following is a guest post by Jessica Goad and Kiley Kroh from the Center for American Progress (CAP). Ms. Goad serves as the Manager of Research and Outreach for the CAP’s Public Lands Project, and Ms. Kroh serves as the Associate Director for Ocean Communications at the Washington-based organization.

Center for American Progress, Green Jobs, Rebuild the American DreamWhile coastal degradation is a serious concern for communities throughout the country, it poses a particular threat to the ecosystem and economy of the Mississippi River Delta. Louisiana is home to 40 percent of the wetlands in the continental United States but experiences about 80 percent of all wetlands losses across the country.  This not only harms habitats, but removes billions of dollars’ worth of natural flood protection and environmental services from coastal communities.  Further, the damage wrought by the BP oil spill continues to threaten industries such as tourism and fisheries that drive local economies throughout the Gulf Coast.  However, restoration projects and their recreation benefits are putting residents of the Mississippi River Delta back to work and rehabilitating these critical resources.

For example, the Central Wetlands Unit (CWU) is a 30,000-acre expanse of degraded marsh near downtown New Orleans.  As a new study conducted by Restore America’s Estuaries found, the $72-million project is on track to create 280 direct jobs and 400 indirect and induced jobs, for a total of 680 jobs over the project’s life.   Once restored, the project will provide long-term ecosystem services and economic benefits for the community – and is just one example of the vast potential offered by the conservation economy.

Center for American Progress, Restoration, Louisiana, Gulf Coast, Wilderness, NatureLast week, the Center for American Progress (CAP) released a report called “The Jobs Case for Conservation:  Creating Opportunity Through Stewardship of America’s Public Lands.”  The report lays out the employment and fiscal impacts of different categories of the conservation economy—recreation, restoration, renewable energy development and sustainable forest management.  We demonstrate that protecting lands and oceans creates jobs, that policymakers should promote policies that manage lands for the conservation value, and that the conservation economy has already created hundreds of thousands of jobs across the country.

Another CAP report released earlier this year with Oxfam entitled “Beyond Recovery” found that addressing the Gulf’s challenges with a regional plan for ecosystem restoration can directly create tens of thousands of jobs. As both publications highlight, restoration jobs also encompass a wide range of education and skill level, from construction workers to contractors to engineers to scientists helping ecosystems return to their undamaged states.

A handful of government and academic studies have attempted to quantify the jobs impacts from conservation, but in “The Jobs Case for Conservation,” we found from various analyses that in general, every $1 million invested in restoration activities creates between 13 and 30 direct, indirect and induced jobs, many in the private sector.  The same holds true for similar projects undertaken in the Gulf Coast region – analysis conducted in “Beyond Recovery” found that each $1 million in investment in wetland restoration can create 29 new jobs.  The design, construction, operation and monitoring of large-scale coastal and marine restoration projects bear the potential for sustaining job creation and increasing ecosystem services vital to supporting existing coastal industries such as fishing, tourism and shipping.

The myriad jobs that can be created from recreation are critical to the future of coastal Louisiana and the Mississippi River delta.  A recent report from the Department of the Interior found that recreation on its lands created 388,000 jobs in 2010 alone.  These jobs include direct, indirect and induced jobs, which in the Mississippi River Delta means work and revenue for outfitters and guides to take visitors to fishing in the Gulf; gear companies that sell equipment to hunters and anglers headed for the Delta National Wildlife Refuge; and the hotels, restaurants, gas stations and other service businesses that cater to visitors from around the world such as restaurants outside of the Big Branch Marsh National Wildlife Refuge.

As both CAP reports emphasize, economic and environmental recovery are not mutually exclusive.  In fact, investing in wetlands and coastal restoration creates nearly six times as many jobs as investments in traditional economic drivers such as oil and gas. In these tough economic times, facilitating coastal restoration presents a perfect opportunity to create jobs and support small businesses, while simultaneously protecting some of America’s most unique ecosystems and prosperous fishing and shellfish industries.

Policymakers both regionally and in Washington, D.C. have a clear opportunity to support the ideas suggested in both CAP reports.  In particular, we need to boost government capacity to conduct restoration activities, fully fund the Land and Water Conservation Fund, and pass the RESTORE the Gulf Coast States Act. The RESTORE Act would direct 80 percent of Clean Water Act fines charged to BP and other responsible parties directly to the five Gulf Coast states to immediately begin ecological and environmental restoration, and establish a National Endowment for the Oceans supporting ocean and coastal restoration efforts in all 35 coastal and Great Lakes states.  With these and more policies in place, coastal Louisiana will be poised to gain the jobs and financial benefits of the conservation economy.

Also posted in BP Oil Disaster, Congress, Employment Ratios, Green Jobs, Multipliers, Oil Spill, Regional Economic Development, Stimulus, Targeted Jobs, The White House, Water, Wetlands, Wildlife | 3 Responses

Environmental Organization Links Habitat Restoration to Job Growth in New Report

By | Bio | Published: September 26, 2011

The following is a guest post from Restore America’s Estuaries President Jeff Benoit.

Efforts to secure adequate federal funding for on-the-ground restoration of critical coastal and estuarine habitats has traditionally depended on arguments related to the ecological importance of these resources. We can no longer rely on good common sense conservation to prevail as we face harsh partisan politics that propose to randomly slash funding and programs that protect our health and contribute significantly to the economy. It’s the latter, the economy, that the conservation community needs to focus more attention on to stay in the game.   Restore America’s Estuaries recently released a report that clearly demonstrates that coasts and estuaries are not only essential to the nation’s economy, but that investments in coastal habitat restoration produce jobs in a cash-strapped, job-starved economy at a higher rate than many other sectors, including oil and gas, road-infrastructure, and green building projects.

The report, “Jobs & Dollars: Big Returns from Coastal Habitat Restoration,” lays out a powerful case for government and private investment in the nation’s coasts and estuaries, drawing on national and regional studies of coastal and estuarine restoration projects and setting out its findings in restoration case studies. As just one example, coastal habitat restoration typically creates between 20 and 32 jobs for every $1 million invested. In comparison, road infrastructure projects on average create seven jobs per million, oil and gas return just five jobs, and green building retrofits produce 17 jobs per $1 million invested.

I invite you to read the report and think about how it relates to your efforts.

Also posted in BP Oil Disaster, Congress, External Media, Green Jobs, Regional Economic Development, Stimulus, Targeted Jobs, Unemployment, Wetlands | Leave a comment

Could House Budget Cuts Hobble Habitat Recovery in Coastal Louisiana?

By | Bio | Published: March 24, 2011

by J.P. Leous

Shortly after our blog debuted last February, we began writing about proposals to employ the elderly and others in the restoration and preservation of Louisiana’s wild spaces.

What a difference a year makes. Thirteen months on, the conversation has shifted from conservation to cutbacks. Political changes in Washington have prompted new calls for budget cuts at the federal level, putting initiatives that protect habitat on the chopping block. Rather than thinking of new environmental programs to implement, conservation advocates are trying to save existing ones from elimination.

What could this mean for the wetlands of Louisiana? We spoke recently with J.P. Leous, a blogger on climate change and land management at The Wilderness Society. In this post, he shares some of his thoughts on how these budget proposals could affect the wildlife of the Pelican State and the workers who depend on them.

We Are the Champions: Kevin VanDam, the victor at the 2011 Bassmaster Classic, smiles with his family after receiving the tournament trophy in New Orleans. The other big winner from the fishing tournament was the state of Louisiana, whose outdoor economy received a boost from the widely-televised event. The future of sport fishing in southern Louisiana could be imperiled if severe cuts to conservation funding affect habitats critical to the region’s aquatic life (Source: ESPN)

If you like to fish, you might have caught part of the 2011 Bassmaster Classic last month on ESPN. For the fourth time in its 29-year history, the tournament was held in the Mississippi River Delta. Louisiana wasn’t chosen for this bass-fishing bonanza because of the charms of Bourbon Street. Instead, it was the waters of the Pelican State that attracted anglers to the event.

The burst of biological riches in these bays, rivers, and streams is largely due to the wetland ecosystems that emerge at the juncture of the Mississippi River and the Gulf of Mexico. This network of marshes and swamps provides important habitat for striped bass and other marine life. In turn, these organisms support a rich web of waterfowl and other wildlife that thrive in the “sportsman’s paradise” that is coastal Louisiana.

It’s a pity then that these wetlands, important as they are to the outdoor tourism economy of southern Louisiana, are vanishing. The Louisiana coast is disappearing fast due to land loss, a problem that could worsen due to sea level rise from climate change. Even in areas far removed from the shore, pollution and land-use policies threaten the long-term survival of wetlands critical to Louisiana’s native species.

The fate of coastal Louisiana will ultimately hinge on efforts to reconnect the Mississippi River with the delta that it built over thousands of years. The restoration of Louisiana’s coastal wetlands will in part be accomplished through the construction of river diversions and other large projects that would increase the rate of sedimentation and land accretion in the Mississippi River Delta. Past sessions of Congress have repeatedly failed to budget the funding needed to save this beleaguered environment. While Congress must still provide federal funding for Louisiana’s large-scale restoration program, critical projects could be expedited by Clean Water Act funding from oil spill penalties, which could yield billions of dollars for ecosystem restoration on the Gulf Coast.

Though the existing programs for wetland protection and wildlife conservation are far smaller in scope, they serve as important parallel projects to the ongoing effort to save southern Louisiana. In the short run, these initiatives provide employment for local people in invasive species control and other environmental fields, while in the long run, they act as useful ways to train people for the sorts of green jobs that will be required as habitats and wild spaces are restored across Louisiana’s coastal zone.

There’s no shortage of work needed if Louisiana’s treasured landscapes and communities are to remain resilient in a warming world. Taking on these short-term and long-term challenges would be a win-win for the economy and the environment, as investments in climate-smart conservation would create jobs today and protect valuable natural assets for tomorrow. Sound public policy on wetland restoration, wildlife protection, and land management is thus critical for the continued success of bass fishing, bird-watching, and other nature-dependent sectors in southern Louisiana.

Slash and Burn

That’s why the recent news from Washington on budget cuts for nature conservation should prompt concern in Louisiana. If the large cuts outlined in the House-passed appropriations bill (H.R. 1) were to pass in the Senate, much of this important work would take a huge step backward.  H.R. 1 takes a meat cleaver to programs that most have never heard of, but from which almost all of us benefit. Such cuts are truly penny-wise and pound-foolish, because addressing environmental maintenance only gets more expensive the longer we wait.

Congressional sunset: The Capitol Building at twilight on a March evening (Source: Flickr (kevharb))

Think of it this way: imagine trying to remove a few weeds from your garden when you see the first signs of trouble. Not too difficult, right? But it’s a different story if you wait until they take over. Now scale that up to hundreds of millions of acres and dozens of exotic and invasive species, and you are starting to get your head around what public land managers are facing.

And if you think these cuts won’t hit your favorite places, think again.  If you’re from the Midwest, you’ve probably benefited directly from the Great Lakes Restoration Initiative. That program would take a $250 million cut, equivalent to 53% of its FY 2010 budget, in the proposed spending bill. Similar programs from San Francisco Bay to Long Island Sound would also face multi-million dollar cuts, resulting in fewer jobs dedicated to preserving these important areas. Other proposed cuts include slashing nearly $49 million from the Department of Interior’s programs to prepare for climate-driven disruptions, eliminating all funding for the Forest Legacy Program (crucial to restoring key forest ecosystems), and prohibiting NOAA from spending any funds to understand the science of climate change.

Oh, and the State and Tribal Wildlife Grant Program, which protects wild habitats and keeps threatened creatures off the endangered species list? Yeah, that was zeroed out in H.R. 1, as was the North American Wetlands Conservation Fund (NAWCF), which leverages federal and non-federal funds to preserve bird habitat.

Workers and Wildlands

Keep in mind that these cuts wouldn’t just hurt wildlife — they would also hit our wallets. Healthy wildlands contribute billions in valuable ecosystem services each year.  Clean air is dependent on healthy forests, and clean water is dependent on healthy wetlands and headwater streams.  These natural spaces also directly support active outdoor recreation, which generates 6.5 million jobs and contributes roughly $730 billion dollars to our national economy each year.

Over the past decade, Louisiana has been a direct beneficiary of several programs slated for cuts. For example, the Fish and Wildlife Service granted Ducks Unlimited $1 million in NAWCF grants last September to restore important wetlands on the Mississippi Flyway. This money created jobs for people in fifteen Louisiana parishes and was used to preserve critical habitats for migratory birds. If the North American Wetlands Conservation Fund was eliminated, this stream of funding and others like it would evaporate, along with employment opportunities for dozens of part-time and full-time workers in the coastal zone.

Considering the problems posed by climate change, the economic downturn, and last year’s oil spill, it seems wise to continue funding labor-intensive upgrades to Louisiana’s green infrastructure. Per dollar invested, conservation projects can create and protect more jobs than many other economic sectors while also helping to preserve the wetlands that are so important to Louisiana’s economy. From tackling invasive species to restoring cypress swamps, there are projects in communities across the Pelican State that we should implement as soon as possible. These projects create jobs for Louisiana residents, improve their public health, and buffer area communities against future climate disruptions. Taking on these challenges now will save money in the long run.

Think to yourself: Would Louisiana’s wetlands be the same without the wildlife that are integral to their health and well-being? Could the state remain a sportsman’s paradise if its habitat for waterfowl and fish disappeared due to neglect and lax oversight?

No one is doubting that America faces fiscal challenges, but it also has environmental and employment issues to deal with, too. Given the projected scale of climate disruptions and the fact that they don’t recognize land designations and property lines, landscape-level approaches will be necessary. Such initiatives, tailored to acknowledge the importance of economic development and environmental health, will also translate into employment growth. Private collaboration and commitment will be an important part of this process, but we still need public funding and support to ensure that these programs succeed.

All eyes are now focused on the fate of the Clean Water Act penalties, a potentially huge stream of money that would be transformative for wetland restoration efforts on the Gulf Coast. But at the same time, we shouldn’t lose sight of the smaller pools of conservation funding that are already being used to create jobs in the wetlands of coastal Louisiana.

Earlier this month, the Senate voted to reject the current version of the House-passed bill, giving Democrats and Republicans an opportunity to reexamine the proposed cuts to habitat protection and restoration initiatives. Thoughtfully pruning and paring down their budgets may be a necessary course of action in this time of fiscal austerity, but the wholesale weed-whacking of conservation programs that benefit Louisiana’s wildlife and workers would leave both worse off.

J.P. Leous is the Climate Change Policy Advisor at The Wilderness Society. In addition, he serves as a lecturer at The George Washington University’s School of Public Health and Health Services. J.P. focuses on natural resource adaptation and other issues related to climate and wildlands policy. An alumnus of the Peace Corps, J.P. graduated from Columbia University’s School of International and Public Affairs (SIPA), where he co-founded the Award for Progressive Sustainability. Follow J.P. on Twitter @TWSjp.

Also posted in Congress, External Media, Fish, Recreation, Targeted Jobs, Tourism, Water, Wetlands, Wildlife | Leave a comment

Climate and Society Column: What the Gulf Coast Could Share with Guatemala on Storm Resilience, Part III

By | Bio | Published: February 28, 2011

by Andrea Basche

This is the post is the final one in Andrea’s three-part series on storm resilience in Guatemala. 

New Orleans-based contractors inspecting and repairing a section of the I-10 bridge after Hurricane Katrina (Source: United Brotherhood of Carpenters)

In the previous two posts in this series, we looked at some of the long-term and short-term weather and climate issues facing Guatemala, focusing on the nation’s experience after Tropical Storm Agatha in 2010. In this post, we’ll discuss how the Gulf Coast, and Louisiana in particular, could help Guatemala in its efforts to adapt to natural hazards such as floods and hurricanes.

Cross-cultural Connections

Like Guatemala, the Gulf Coast lies in a hurricane zone. As such, businesses, universities, and non-profit organizations in Louisiana and its neighbors are familiar with the risks associated with these disasters. Based on their recent experiences with hurricanes Katrina, Rita, and Gustav, these institutions could provide some guidance for the people of Guatemala in the area of storm resilience.

The Gulf Coast already has substantial business ties with Guatemala, as shown in the below chart. According to the U.S. Census Bureau’s Foreign Trade Division, Louisiana shipped over $519 million worth of goods to Guatemala in 2009. However, output from companies in the hazard mitigation sector accounted for only a small subset of total export volume. With the right mix of innovation and investment, trade between Louisiana and Guatemala could increase further through deals on products and services related to storm management and flood control.

Plastic manufacturers in coastal Louisiana could supply piping and gutters for improved rainwater management in Guatemalan communities.  In addition, Louisiana homebuilders could share some of their understanding of roof construction and home elevation with Guatemala’s construction industry to reduce the effects of flood and wind damage on residential neighborhoods.  Environmental management experts at Louisiana’s academic institutions could work with Guatemalans on wetland and forest management programs to increase natural protection from hillside erosion and floods.  Heavy construction companies could expand on their existing work with Guatemalan contractors to design and build roadways, railways and bridges that are more resilient to mudslides and rain-induced damage.

A Growth Market in Guatemala: The chart above illustrates the dramatic increase in trade between Guatemala and the Gulf Coast over the past ten years. Foodstuffs and chemicals account for much of the export volume from Louisiana’s ports at present, but products linked to flood protection and hazard mitigation could become important components of the trade mix in the near future (Sources: U.S. Census Bureau; World Institute of Strategic Economic Research (WISER); World Trade Center New Orleans)

Non-profit groups and universities already are forming these cross-cultural connections. After Hurricane Mitch hit Central America in 1998, researchers from the University of Louisiana at Lafayette worked with the National Wetlands Research Center and USAID to assess ecological damage and guide the recovery of mangrove forests, seagrass beds, estuarine systems, and marine life populations in Guatemala and Honduras.  The UL Lafayette researchers were specifically tapped for their expertise because of their experience analyzing Gulf Coast wetlands and wildlife after hurricanes Andrew and Georges.  More recently, the Resilience Institute at Western Washington University has worked with Oxfam International and households near Guatemala’s capital to develop frameworks for urban disaster risk reduction.

Where academic conversations already are occurring, businesses soon could follow. New Orleans is one of the closest U.S. cities to Central America, making it a perfect location for increased economic interaction with Guatemala and its neighbors. The trade and disaster management links will benefit both Guatemalans and Gulf Coast residents. The people of Central America could develop low-cost disaster mitigation techniques that would be useful in the mountains of Sacatepéquez and the marshes of St. Bernard Parish.  At the same time, firms in Louisiana could invest in scalable technologies for storm resilience in the developing world.  This cross-cultural exchange will generate economic activity on the Gulf Coast and in Guatemala, creating jobs and new opportunities for businesses in both areas.

Source: As Green As It Gets (AGAIG)

As bad as Agatha was, storms that are worse inevitably will descend on Guatemala. As its people develop their economy and infrastructure, they will also need to develop methods to cope with hurricanes and the damage they bring.  Non-profit organizations like AGAIG and universities like UL Lafayette already are trying to bridge the gap, but this effort could be kicked into higher gear through the involvement of corporations and small businesses.  Community resilience practices and flood protection products from the Gulf Coast could be key in helping Guatemalans to achieve the bright and sustainable future that they deserve.

Andrea Basche is a researcher and teaching assistant at Columbia University's Earth Institute. She works on projects at the intersection of climate adaptation and agricultural development, with a particular focus on Latin America and Southeast Asia.  A graduate of Fordham and Columbia, Ms. Basche has also written posts for the Wall Street Journal's Metropolis blog and the Earth Institute's Climate Matters blog. 

Also posted in Climate and Society, Flood Protection, International, Storms | Leave a comment

Climate and Society Column: What the Gulf Coast Could Share with Guatemala on Storm Resilience, Part II

By | Bio | Published: February 24, 2011

by Andrea Basche

This is the second post in our three-part series on flood and storm response in Guatemala, and how it could be improved through collaborative efforts with organizations and companies on the Gulf Coast.

In my last post, I looked at the challenges that Guatemala and other developing countries face due to climate change. Unfortunately, planning for long-term risks must often be postponed because near-term crises take precedence. In this piece, we'll look at one of those disasters in detail, and in the last post of the series, we will discuss how Guatemala's responsiveness to storm risk could be enhanced through a longer-term strategy of adaptation and resilience.

La Tormenta Tropical 

Fixing a Hole, Where the Rain Gets In: Agatha brought torrential rains to Guatemala City last May. Many of its neighborhoods are built on loose, ashy soils that collapse when flooded with water. The sudden movement of mud and gravel underground can cause rapid subsidence to occur at the surface, creating chasms like the 100-ft. deep "sinkhole" pictured above (Sources: Discovery, Flickr (horslips5))

Tropical Storm Agatha formed last May in the warm waters of the tropical Pacific.  What began as a cluster of thunderstorms on May 24 morphed into a tropical depression as the system moved north across open ocean. On May 29, Agatha made landfall near the Guatemala/Mexico border.

As it cut across Central America towards the Caribbean Sea, the storm left a trail of death and devastation.  On May 29 and May 30, Agatha pounded its way through a densely populated corridor of southern Guatemala, delivering as much as three feet of rain in a twenty-four hour period.  Portions of Guatemala received their highest rainfall in six decades, turning dirt roads into mud traps and cutting off transportation throughout much of Guatemala’s mountainous interior.

At least 160 Guatemalans lost their lives in the storm, which damaged 95 percent of the country’s roads and destroyed nearly 200 bridges.  A great deal of media attention fell on Guatemala City and the massive sinkhole that emerged near its urban core after Agatha, but there was much less coverage of the storm’s effect on rural communities.

In San Miguel Escobar, the rains unleashed an estimated 400,000 cubic meters of soil and loose rock from surrounding hillsides, causing mudslides that destroyed 65 homes, damaged another 40 residences, and resulted in four fatalities.  About 75 percent of the maize crop was lost, as well as freshly planted wheat, oats, and coffee.

The town’s residents partnered with AGAIG to immediately begin the process of rebuilding.  “Our families cooked several thousand meals for victims and rescue workers,” said Franklin Voorhes, the organization’s founder.  “They distributed thousands of dollars of building materials. Eight months later, they continue to coordinate the construction of homes and rebuilding of workshops.  Even a few years ago they didn’t have enough margin in their lives to provide that type of support.”

Scenes from San Miguel Escobar before and after Agatha. Local volunteers worked hard to undo the damage wrought by the massive storm (Sources: As Green As It Gets; Wikimedia Commons)

San Miguel Escobar was relatively lucky that it had some resources on hand to cope with this disaster. However, it is important to remember that all this damage was due to a rainstorm that never even reached hurricane status, meaning that stronger hits from future storms might overwhelm the limited disaster management capacity of the town and others like it across Guatemala.

And when one looks at the climate forecasts for the next few decades, the situation looks like it may get worse before it gets better.

Less Frequent Rain, More Violent Storms

The 2007 IPCC Regional Projections suggest that Central America likely will see an overall decrease in precipitation between now and the end of the 21st century due to global warming.  At the same time, a study published last year in Nature Geoscience suggests that hurricanes and other tropical storms may be more violent when they do hit the region, as cyclone activity in the tropics is expected to increase in intensity while decreasing in frequency.  This scenario suggests that the likely trend is toward fewer, but far more intense storms, so while Guatemala may receive less annual precipitation in the coming decades, it will be at greater risk for more heavy precipitation events if and when rainstorms arrive. 

This outlook is very frightening for a poor country with underdeveloped infrastructure that is heavily reliant on rain-fed agriculture.  How will Guatemala deal with these issues?  How should its residents construct homes to better weather stronger hurricanes?  What sort of infrastructure should be developed to cope with more intense floods?

In our next post, we will consider some of the ways that Louisiana and its neighbors along the Gulf Coast could help Guatemala to address these challenges.

Andrea Basche is a researcher and teaching assistant at Columbia University's Earth Institute. She works on projects at the intersection of climate adaptation and agricultural development, with a particular focus on Latin America and Southeast Asia.  A graduate of Fordham and Columbia, Ms. Basche has also written posts for the Wall Street Journal's Metropolisblog and the Earth Institute's Climate Matters blog.

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Climate and Society Column: What the Gulf Coast Could Share with Guatemala on Storm Resilience, Part I

By | Bio | Published: February 22, 2011

by Andrea Basche

Here at Restoration and Resilience, we’re interested in more than just wetlands. We are also involved in efforts to protect Louisiana’s people from the hazards associated with life on the Gulf Coast. Hurricanes and floods are ingrained into the cultural history of the region, and its residents are actively designing strategies and products to mitigate the effects of those natural disasters. 

The Pelican State potentially could serve as a model for other parts of the world that deal with periodic storms and deluges. As a hub for consulting, engineering, and planning firms, Louisiana’s coastal zone could one day be the epicenter for idea generation on hazard protection.

We will be exploring this theme in a new series called “Climate and Society Column.” The contributors will be students and graduates of the Climate and Society program at Columbia University’s Earth Institute. They will be sharing their insights on climate-sensitive parts of the world, and the potential opportunities for partnership between those regions and coastal Louisiana.

Our first C&S contributor will be Andrea Basche, a 2010 graduate of the Climate and Society program who focuses on sustainable agriculture in the developing world.

Away She Goes: The rainy remnants of Tropical Storm Agatha move through the Gulf of Honduras in this NOAA satellite image taken on May 31, 2010. Agatha originated in the Pacific Ocean and traversed Central America before dissipating in the western Caribbean. The storm brought heavy precipitation to Guatemala and its neighbors, triggering disastrous landslides that prompted questions about regional resilience to flood disasters (Source: Palm Beach Daily News)

2010 was a year marked by extreme and unpleasant weather around the world. There were many headlines covering the extensive floods in Pakistan, the severe snowstorms in the United States, and the punishing droughts in Russia, but in Guatemala, where I spent several weeks working on rural development, it was a late spring storm and its aftermath that resonated most.

Wacky weather always has affected human societies, but the wild card in our forecasts for the coming decades is climate change.  Scientists are researching how global warming will affect the variability of seasonal and inter-annual climate trends.  Climate change creates tremendous uncertainty about the projected impacts of hurricanes and other seasonal weather events.

The consequences of this uncertainty are arguably most significant for developing countries.  It’s because those nations often depend on agriculture and other economic activities that are extremely sensitive to climate.  An unusually heavy rainstorm might cause headaches in Calgary, but it is unlikely to cut off the city’s access to the rest of Canada.  By contrast, a heavy downpour in Central America could leave a dirt road impassable for days, making it impossible for rural producers to ship their perishable produce to market.  As a result, adaptation and planning for extreme weather events is a critical component of development in the world’s poorer countries.

The people of Guatemala will need tools and training to protect themselves from floods and mudslides when heavy rain events do occur.  During the next several decades, they will forge links with companies and organizations to develop the necessary infrastructure for community resilience.  The Gulf Coast of the United States, given its own history of hurricanes, can and should be an obvious partner for Guatemala in these efforts.

Sustainable Growth in San Miguel Escobar

(Click to enlarge) The map above shows Guatemala's twenty-two departments. Sacatepéquez, with its capital at Antigua Guatemala, is outlined in red (Source: Geology)

Sandwiched between Mexico, Belize, Honduras, and El Salvador, Guatemala is situated between the Caribbean Sea and the Pacific Ocean.  The Tennessee-sized nation is home to more than 14 million people, making it the largest country by population in Central America.

Agriculture plays an important role in Guatemala’s economy. About half of the country’s 4.3 million workers depend on farming for their livelihoods, but the nation ranks low in food security.  While Guatemala is far from the poorest country in Latin America, it ranks high in income inequality and youth malnutrition.  To address these challenges, nonprofits like As Green As It Gets (AGAIG), for which I volunteered last summer, have stepped in to work with Guatemala’s rural residents on sustainable agriculture and economic diversification.

As Green As It Gets is based in San Miguel Escobar, a town in the western department of Sacatepéquez.  San Miguel Escobar lies in a valley encircled by several mountains.  On the steep hillsides surrounding the town, its inhabitants grow coffee for foreign markets, along with maize, wheat, and vegetables for domestic consumption. The workers and volunteers at AGAIG partner with San Miguel Escobar's farmers to improve agricultural yields and increase access to microlending.

As Green As It Gets began its work six years ago by offering small business loans for new entrepreneurial enterprises.  These small businesses were entirely overseen by the local community, and they allowed the villagers to try new ventures.  The program has been successful, and other side businesses, such as the sale of locally-produced cosmetics, handbags and jewelry, now provide additional income for families in the community. However, it is still the cultivation and export of coffee and others rain-fed crops that dominate the economic life of San Miguel Escobar. 

For that reason, a weather event that displaces workers, impedes travel or diminishes agricultural productivity can be disastrous for the town. Unfortunately, a tropical storm last spring accomplished all three of those economic traumas in the space of a few hours.

In the next post of this series, we’ll look back at Tropical Storm Agatha and its effect on San Miguel Escobar and other Guatemalan communities.

Andrea Basche is a researcher and teaching assistant at Columbia University's Earth Institute. She works on projects at the intersection of climate adaptation and agricultural development, with a particular focus on Latin America and Southeast Asia.  A graduate of Fordham and Columbia, Ms. Basche has also written posts for the Wall Street Journal's Metropolis blog and the Earth Institute's Climate Matters blog.

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R&R Roundtable: Is It Time to “Scaleback” the Spill Response?

By | Bio | Published: August 6, 2010

Following in his footsteps? Robert Dudley walks behind outgoing BP CEO Tony Hayward (foreground) after a June meeting with President Obama in Washington. Like his predecessor, Dudley has generated fresh controversy with his recent comments about the oil spill, suggesting that BP might significantly curb its dedicated disaster response in the coming weeks (Source: Reuters)

On Wednesday morning, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) and the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) released a report stating that the risks of oil exposure to people and wildlife living near the BP spill are now low due to the rapid breakdown of leaked petroleum in the warm, turbid waters of the Gulf of Mexico. According to NOAA, nearly three-fourths of the 4.9 million barrels leaked into the Gulf have been collected, evaporated, broken down into tiny fragments, or dispersed by COREXIT and other chemicals applied by BP in its response to the spill.

This report comes on the heels of comments last week by Robert "Bob" Dudley, a BP director slated to become the company's CEO this autumn. With the well cap working and the static kill procedure on course for completionat the Deepwater Horizon site, Dudley stated that the time has come for BP to "scaleback" its cleanup efforts on the Gulf Coast.

The situation there may indeed be improving, given the huge volume of the Gulf of Mexico and recent storm activity near the Macondo well site. Still, with the massive amount of oil that spilled into the waters off coastal Louisiana and the unprecedented use of dispersants throughout the water column, might it be too early to close the curtain on this disaster?

For our first roundtable, we collected the opinions of several in-house experts at EDF.

James “Jim” Tripp is Senior Counsel for the Environmental Defense Fund and serves as a member of the Louisiana Governor’s Commission on Coastal Restoration & Conservation. He has worked on restoring coastal Louisiana's wetlands for more than three decades.

JT: If the Government's report is basically credible, then that is indeed good news.  Environmentalists are often accused of being alarmists and overstating harm from some course of events.  We do not want to do that.  However, my interpretation of the report is that "the solution to pollution is dilution". 

The Gulf of Mexico, unlike more confined bodies of water such as Prince William Sound, is huge. Five million barrels of oil dispersed through the vast Gulf would reach a very low concentration in due time.

[NOAA Administrator] Jane Lubchenco rightly points to the really serious scientific issue: what impact will low, dispersed concentrations of oil breaking down slowly at various depths have on oceanic eggs, larvae, and juveniles over the coming months and years? We must understand this in order to determine what effect, if any, the spill will have on food webs in the Gulf.

Jason Funk, Ph.D. is a conservation analyst in the Land, Water, & Wildlife (LWW) and International Climate Programs

(Click to enlarge) Miami Herald cartoonist Jim Morin illustrated his views on the health of the Gulf in an Op-Art piece published on Wednesday (Source: McClatchy)

JF: It’s definitely not time for a "scaleback", but it probably is time for a transition in terms of the cleanup activities. The need for skimming and burning will rapidly diminish, but we still need to make the affected areas and communities whole again. We need to start by collecting the data to properly document the impacts of the oil – and let’s not forget that up to 150 million gallons of oil are still out there, either as dissolved oil, dispersed oil, or oil residue. That oil hasn’t "disappeared", even if it’s no longer at the surface. I think BP should be held accountable for continuing efforts to track and document the impacts of the spill, and we should keep employing fishing boats and unemployed people to help in the assessment process. So while it may be true that we’re ending the triage stage, we need to ramp up the efforts to assess the damage to the patient, develop a diagnosis, and start administering treatment. The recovery process is really just beginning.

Steven Hamburg, Ph.D. is an ecosystem ecologist and EDF’s chief scientist 

SH: The analogy that I’ve used to describe the Gulf is that it has gone from critical to stable condition, but it’s still going to take a lot of effort and a long time before it returns to health. The government report says 25% of the oil has been collected, 25% is still in the Gulf, and 50% is in the form of smaller molecules that remain biologically active. Most of these smaller molecules are still somewhere in the Gulf’s waters, and as they decompose, they will consume oxygen, which will threaten the Gulf ecosystem. In addition, even when the oil is dispersed, it remains toxic. The real challenge is continuing to undertake remediation efforts while also ensuring that a science-based, long-term monitoring and research program is established to gauge the health of the Gulf.  A continuing program is key to maximizing the effectiveness of our remediation efforts. Furthermore, it will provide us with the information needed to respond to and understand oil spills if (and when) they occur in the future.

Stacy Small, Ph.D. is a wildlife ecologist specializing in bird populations

SS: The $500 million BP Gulf Research Initiative (GRI) should be managed by an esteemed, independent scientific organization like the National Science Foundation (NSF) with guidance from the National Academy of Sciences (NAS), which would allow for truly independent, peer-reviewed administration of research funds. This would ensure the most credible, ongoing scientific analysis, free from perceived political or corporate influence. It would also enable the broader scientific community, the public, and elected officials to better evaluate any sweeping statements about the Gulf's recovery, without PR spin. Scientists engaged in research under this initiative should be permitted to freely publish and speak about their results. Confidential forensic data collected under contract to BP or the government for use in court cases is distinct from independent science published according to accepted standards of academic freedom and rigor. There is an enormous need for more of the latter following the BP oil disaster, for the greater good of society, science, and the natural world.

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