By Lester R. Brown
Elevated global temperatures bring a number of threats, including rising seas and more crop-withering heat waves. Higher surface water temperatures in the tropical oceans also provide more energy to drive tropical storm systems, leading to more-destructive hurricanes and typhoons. The combination of rising seas, more powerful storms, and stronger storm surges can be devastating.
As noted in my most recent book, Plan B 3.0: Mobilizing to Save Civilization, just how devastating this combination can be became evident in late August 2005, when Hurricane Katrina came onshore on the U.S. Gulf Coast near New Orleans. In some Gulf Coast towns, Katrina’s powerful 28-foot-high storm surge did not leave a single structure standing. New Orleans survived the initial hit but was flooded when the inland levees were breached and water covered everything in large parts of the city except for the rooftops, where thousands of people were stranded. Even in August 2006, a year after the storm had passed, the most damaged areas of the city remained without water, power, sewage disposal, garbage collection, or telecommunications.
With advance warning of the storm and official urging to evacuate coastal areas, 1 million or so evacuees fled northward into Louisiana or to neighboring states of Texas and Arkansas. Of this total, more than 200,000 have not yet returned home and will likely never do so. These storm evacuees are the world’s first large wave of climate refugees.
Katrina was the most financially destructive hurricane ever to make landfall anywhere. It was one of eight hurricanes that hit the southeastern United States in 2004 and 2005. As a result of the unprecedented damage, insurance premiums have doubled, tripled, and even in some especially vulnerable situations gone up 10-fold. This enormous jump in insurance costs is lowering coastal real estate values and driving people and businesses out of highly exposed states like Florida.
Whether they are “social” entrepreneurships or just plain entrepreneurships, it is clear that New Orleans is laying the right groundwork for a full-scale “and then some” recovery.
By Robin Shreeves •
February 11, 2009
If you were to click on my bio here for Sustainablog, you’d see that I started down this green path because my son who was six at the time had read about global warming and gave us the “what for” over the SUV we owned. We joke now with him that he was the one that got this whole thing started for our family, yet at times he seems, at almost ten years old, the least interested in the environment. In a way, that may be a good thing.
The Boston Globe reported that Climate change takes a mental toll, and that children and adults alike are starting to have “psychosis or anxiety disorders focused on climate change.” Children especially “are having nightmares about global-warming-related natural disasters.”
Three and a half years after New Orleans was devastated by post-Katrina levee failures, the Big Easy is still working to bounce back … and it’s coming back greener than ever.
(Did you know, by the way, that President Barack Obama’s pick for head of the Environmental Protection Agency — Linda Jackson — grew up in the lower Ninth Ward?)
So what’s new and green in the Crescent City? Check out some of these developments:
By Timothy B. Hurst •
January 2, 2009
The U.S. Department of Energy today announced that it plans to take advantage of the recent decline in crude oil prices, and has issued a solicitation to purchase approximately 12 million barrels of crude oil for the nation’s Strategic Petroleum Reserve (SPR) to replenish supplies sold following hurricanes Katrina and Rita in 2005.
By Derek Markham •
December 3, 2008
The most technologically advanced, eco-friendly, solar powered playground, the first of its kind in North America, is being dedicated in New Orleans’ Lower Ninth Ward today.
The Lower Ninth Ward in New Orleans suffered catastrophic flooding after Hurricane Katrina pummeled New Orleans on August 29, 2005, and many of the residents lost their homes.
They also lost something else.
Playgrounds.
What a great way to both help restore a critical ecosystem while teaching young kids valuable lessons about the real world: encourage schoolchildren to grow wetland plants at their schools for later planting in coastal habitat restoration projects.
That’s what Louisiana State University’s (LSU) Coastal Roots Project aims to do. Established in the pre-Katrina days of 2001, the program is now more vital than ever and — happy to say — schools across the state have come on board to join the cause.
What’s the opposite of one of those formaldehyde-reeking FEMA trailers so many Katrina victims had to live in — and get sick in — for months and months? Check out New York artist Paul Villinski’s “Emergency Response Studio,” a solar-powered, refurbished, non-toxic and self-sufficient artist’s studio on wheels.
Set to go on display Nov. 1 as part of the Prospect.1 New Orleans art show, Villlinski’s trailer is a mobile testament to his mission of transforming trash into objects of beauty or functionality (he’s also created butterfly sculptures out of old beer cans and LPs, and wings, jackets, blankets and bags out of lost gloves).
So many hard-working and innovative people have stepped in with projects to help rebuild New Orleans in the wake of the devastating 2005 levee failures, but the Fundred Dollar Bill Project is beyond unique.
The project’s goal is to encourage schoolchildren across the U.S. to create their own version of a $100 bill dubbed a “Fundred Dollar Bill” (a blend of “fun,” “fund” and “hundred”) … for a total of 3 million Fundreds in all. Once completed, those 3 million Fundreds will be collected for delivery to Washington, D.C., in a biofuel-powered armored truck in hopes of receiving in return $300 million in real currency to protect New Orleans residents — kids especially — from the toxic levels of lead found in the city’s soil.
By Levi Novey •
August 15, 2008
Everglades National Park has obtained approval to proceed with a plan to redesign the most developed area of the park with an emphasis on promoting sustainability. Through building design, alternative energy, and improved transportation systems, the park area known as “Flamingo” will be reborn as an example for other parks to follow.
Flamingo is near the very bottom tip of Florida’s mainland, and in 2005, Hurricanes Katrina and Wilma landed a knock-out punch to what was until then a heavily visited area. Damage from the hurricanes effectively destroyed a dilapidated but popular lodge, its restaurant, and numerous other facilities– leaving virtually no place for park visitors to stay overnight in the park if not camping.
The park was pressured by numerous groups to rebuild overnight visitor facilities as soon as possible. After releasing several plans and receiving public comment, the park has selected a plan that blends sustainable ideas with creature comforts. I myself used to work as a park ranger in Flamingo, and I think the plan is brilliant. There’s only one catch: the park has no idea where to get the estimated $20-23 million it needs to bring the plan to fruition.
By Levi Novey •
June 13, 2008
Before I write anything else, I want to unequivocally explain that I think natural disasters are terrible. They cause countless deaths and incredible human suffering. With that being understood, I often find myself believing that things happen in nature for a reason, and so I started to ponder what some of the good aspects to natural disasters might be. I’ve come up with three ideas about what might be some positive consequences of natural disasters.
By Lester R. Brown
