Earth Wind & Fire. Game Changing Restoration Options in the Texas Chenier Plain

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Magdalen Farmer
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1 Earth Wind & Fire Game Changing Restoration Options in the Texas Chenier Plain

2 EARTH: The Chenier Plain is a 5 million acre coastal region in Southwest Louisiana and Southeast Texas providing landscape scale restoration opportunity. Chenier soils are deltaic from ancient times when sea levels were higher and the Mississippi s outlet was near present day Vicksburg. Soils flowed westerly blanketing today s Chenier Plain was the International Year of Soil. Chenier soils are biologically rich but highly vulnerable to salt water intrusion. There are more micro-organisms in a tea spoon of soil than there are people on Earth. Deepwater Horizon restoration can preserve the Chenier Plain soils.

3 Wind: Powerful hurricanes and tropical storms frequent the Chenier Plain bringing salt water intrusion that destroys fresh water dependent vegetation holding deltaic soils together. Hurricane Ike (below) caused $30 billion in damages to coastal and inland areas with a huge portion of the damages occurring along the Upper Texas coast. Fast Facts: In 1871, there were three hurricanes impacting Salt Bayou. The largest storm surge was 21.1 feet at Sabine Pass which occurred in 1940 from an unnamed Category 2 hurricane. In 1957, Hurricane Audrey (Category 4) had an 8-10 foot storm surge at Sabine Pass. Hurricane Rita, in 2005 had a 10 foot storm surge at Sabine Pass, and Hurricane Ike in 2008 had a 14-foot storm surge over Salt Bayou Watershed.

Strategic Petroleum Reserve, and the #1 military embarkation port in the free

4 Fire in the Texas Chenier Plain signifies nationally important energy and national defense assets including refinery complexes, over half the nation s Strategic Petroleum Reserve, and the #1 military embarkation port in the free world at Port of Beaumont, all located in and protected by Texas largest coastal marsh.

5 Private sector leaders are reacting to sea level rise, intense storms and land subsidence. Below is Entergy s map showing that the well known Louisiana land loss problem extends into Southeast Texas.

6 Coastal conditions at Lafourche Parish, LA (below) show a threat scenario Southeast Texas hopes to avoid via Deepwater Horizon funding. Louisiana s coast is losing a football field per hour at present. Louisiana s Master Plan for coastal conservation has a 500- year vision.

7 Proven strategies such as beach renourishment (left), the clay berm construction in Jefferson and Chambers counties (top right) and Ducks Unlimited s rock armoring project of the Gulf Intercoastal Waterway (bottom) are vital and working.

Foundation, Jefferson Co. and local industry funded the project.

8 Below left is the recently completed Keith Lake Fish Pass underwater rock barrier (or baffle ) sharply restricting salt water intrusion into JD Murphree WMA. The Texas Parks and Wildlife Dept. Foundation, Jefferson Co. and local industry funded the project. Below right, a private levee in Orange Co is failing to keep Sabine Lake salt water out of freshwater wetlands near Bridge City, Cow Bayou, Chemical Row and the Port of Orange and needs $$.

9 America s shale gas revolution has brought an industrial renaissance to the Gulf, centered in the Chenier Plain from Baytown to Lake Charles. Southeast Texas 7% annual manufacturing growth exceeds China s growth rate. Texas LNG and NGL exports are primed for world trade impact. Gas use lowers U.S. carbon emissions by replacing coal as a utility fuel. Mont Belvieu s salt dome on the western edge of the Chenier Plain near Baytown, has 40% of the nation s gas storage capacity. The Sabine Neches Waterway surpassed the Port of New York New Jersey last year to become the nation s 3 rd largest port by tonnage helping Texas lead the nation in exports for 14 years in a row. In the 2014 Water Resources Development Act, Congress apportioned 40% of the nation s total ports and harbors budget to the Sabine Neches Waterway. Fast Fact: The successful mission against Ebola embarked from the Port of Beaumont handled by the U.S. Army s 842 nd Transportation Battalion.

The U.S. has 12,000 miles of inland waterways. The highest valued cargo section of the system is the Texas Chenier Plain from Galveston Bay to the Sabine River.

10 The U.S. has 12,000 miles of inland waterways. The highest valued cargo section of the system is the Texas Chenier Plain from Galveston Bay to the Sabine River. Fast fact: 52% percent of the GIWW s tonnage from Florida to Mexico traverses the 84-mile Texas Chenier Plain section. Healthy marshes protect this vital economic asset from open Gulf of Mexico waters.

Stronger Together Regional and multistate partnerships can help state and federal agencies meet the landscape scale goals of the RESTORE Act, Gulf Environmental Benefits Fund and NRDA.

11 Stronger Together Regional and multistate partnerships can help state and federal agencies meet the landscape scale goals of the RESTORE Act, Gulf Environmental Benefits Fund and NRDA. In 2014, three Texas Chenier Plain counties, Chambers, Jefferson and Orange signed an MOU with three southwest Louisiana parishes Calcasieu, Cameron and Vermilion, to promote multi-species, multi-resource successes within the Gulf of Mexico s 200-mile Chenier Plain coastl section (from Galveston Bay to Vermilion Bay). Fast fact: >50% of fresh water reaching the Gulf from Texas comes from the Sabine Neches watershed. Add the Trinity in Chambers County to the Sabine Neches and the fresh water contribution to the Gulf from Texas from watersheds traversing the Chenier Plain equals two thirds of the state s total on an annual basis.

Hurricane Protection and Environmental Restoration

November 16, 2010 Hurricane Protection and Environmental Restoration Presented by: Colonel (Ret.) Leonard Waterworth AGENDA How do we protect People/Environment/Economy 1900 Year Storm Hurricane Carla