36% of river levees fail safety levels

About 36 percent of state-controlled river levees do not meet the safety standards of the Construction and Transport Ministry, with lots of coarse-grained sand making it easy for water to soak into the ground, it was learned Sunday.

Following a request by The Yomiuri Shimbun to disclose such information, the ministry said 117 river levees with a total length of 2,113 kilometers out of the surveyed 133 levees over 5,922 kilometers did not meet the standards as of end of March.

While river levees have been repeatedly reinforced and repaired, their actual condition came to light for the first time since records were first kept.

According to Nihon Shoki, or Chronicle of Japan, the earliest river conservation work was done in the year 323 on the Yodogawa river in Osaka, but the strength of levees has not been quantitatively checked since then.

from the Daily Yomiuri Online

New hurricane classification scale created

U.S. scientists are proposing a new hurricane classification scale that measures what the big storms do when they hit land.

U.S. hurricane forecasters currently use only the Saffir-Simpson scale to classify hurricane severity by number, from 1 to 5. The SS scale evaluates winds and storm surge over open water in the pre-landfall window, but critics say it fails to accurately account for the observed impacts over land.

from UPI

Climate change: A nasty surprise in the greenhouse

Methane is a potent greenhouse gas — per molecule, more than 20 times as powerful as carbon dioxide1. Moreover, when methane emissions rise, so too does the concentration of the pollutant ozone in the troposphere, the lowest layer of Earth's atmosphere2. Methane also consumes hydroxyl radicals, whose oxidative effects are essential to atmospheric cleansing. On page 439 of this issue [of Nature], Bousquet et al. recount the results of an international effort to measure atmospheric methane concentrations and combine these data with a computer model of atmospheric chemistry and transport. The bad news is that the slowdown in global methane emissions in the past few decades was only temporary: reports of the emissions' control have been exaggerated.


At present, about two-thirds of global methane comes from anthropogenic sources, and most emissions occur in the Northern Hemisphere (Fig. 1). Of naturally produced methane, the largest proportion stems from bacteria in wetlands that produce the gas when decomposing organic material. The growth rate of atmospheric methane was more than 10% per decade before 1980, but by the 1990s it had dropped to nearly zero (Fig. 2). Bousquet and colleagues compute the global methane source distribution, especially its variability over recent decades. This is a rather controversial issue, as it is difficult to determine whether this variability should be attributed to fluctuations in the sources or in the sinks; the sink mechanisms are dominated by the good offices of the atmospheric hydroxyl radicals.


from Nature

Emblem of the West Is Dying, and No One Can Figure Out Why

The aspen, an emblematic tree of the West and the most widely distributed tree in North America, is rapidly and mysteriously dying.

Its rapid decline is bewildering scientists and forest ecologists, who say they cannot pinpoint a cause.

“What’s causing the aspen to die?” asked Wayne Shepperd, a veteran researcher at the Rocky Mountain Research Center of the United States Forest Service. “We don’t know. Maybe this has been there all along, and we haven’t noticed it before, or maybe it’s something new.”

There is no shortage of suspects. Forest experts, who met this month at a conference in Utah to discuss the problem and look for solutions, say it may be insects, drought or climatic stress in general or overgrazing by animals like elk and cattle. Or it may be none or all of the above.

from the NY Times

An El Nino this winter?

Meteorologists are reporting that an El Niño may be on the way again this winter but it may not be the strong El Niño that leads to torrential rains and flooding like the one back in 1998. Scientists said there's evidence another is heating up waters in the central Pacific but Art Miller of the Scripps Institute of Oceanography said it looks to be mild-to-moderate in size.

Still, he said anything is possible when it comes to long-range weather forecasts. "There's always a possibility though, because of the complicated nature of El Niño that it could become a stronger event in the coming months and by that, might influence us a bit more strongly as well in rainfall," Miller said.

from NBC San Diego

Porong declared disaster-prone; residents to be relocated

President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono declared Wednesday a district in East Java inundated by mudflow from a gas exploration well a disaster-prone area and ordered the relocation of its residents, a minister said.

"The affected area in is no longer habitable so the residents need to be relocated," Public Works Minister Djoko Kirmanto was quoted as saying by Antara news agency.

"The president has ordered 2,983 families in the affected area to be relocated and given proper employment and compensation."

from The Jakarta Post

New Orleans neighborhood plans unveiled

Almost 13 months after Hurricane Katrina plunged New Orleans into crisis, hundreds of people flocked to City Hall on Saturday to view the final planning reports for 46 flood-damaged neighborhoods, from eastern New Orleans to Lakeview.

For the professional planners hired by the City Council to sketch out ways the flood-ravaged sections can recover from the storm, this was game day.

Break out the overhead projector.

The final reports, the culmination of a monthslong planning project paid for by a $2.9 million grant from the City Council, together represent the most detailed citywide planning effort, after planners chosen by Mayor Ray Nagin's Bring New Orleans Back Commission failed to deliver a broad recovery plan, citing a lack of money.

But the council-generated plans together hold a price tag of more than $2 billion, a tab greater than what is expected to be available to New Orleans from federal Community Development Block Grant money to be doled out by the Louisiana Recovery Authority.

from the Times Picayune

links to the plans from the Times Picayune

Lower 9th Plan: Start 'From Scratch'

A consulting firm hired by the New Orleans City Council to devise a plan for the city's most storm-damaged neighborhoods will recommend rebuilding the Lower 9th Ward — considered by many "ground zero" of the destruction wrought by Hurricane Katrina — "from scratch."

Miami-based urban planner and housing consultant Paul Lambert, along with other urban planning groups, met with Lower 9th Ward residents and incorporated their ideas into a proposal to change the area's street pattern to create a new "town center." That idea is part of a report he is to present to residents today.

from the LA Times

Locale hit by Katrina oil spill empty a year later

Eileen Schwartz stands on the sidewalk in front of her one-story house with new, blue siding, refurbished after the biggest environmental disaster created by Hurricane Katrina.

Looking down the street of abandoned houses and overgrown lawns in Chalmette, Louisiana, she explains what it's like to live where a year ago crude oil covered pavement, grass, porches, floors and furniture

from Reuters

Katrina, Rita Actually Helped Wetlands, Study Says

A new study makes the provocative claim that Hurricanes Katrina and Rita actually helped stabilize coastal wetlands by depositing tons of silt and sediment—even as the storms devastated dozens of square miles of the low-lying areas.

The new findings contradict long-held theories that rivers are the primary source of the sediment that forms wetlands, says research leader R. Eugene Turner, an ecologist at Louisiana State University (LSU) in Baton Rouge.

from National Geographic News

Muddy Waters Mud Flap

To fix its threadbare coast and restore the state's natural hurricane defenses, Louisiana is going to need mud. A lot of it. And no one has more mud than the Army Corps of Engineers.

Every year, the corps' New Orleans district dredges on average 70 million cubic yards of sediment from waterways to keep them clear for maritime navigation -- the largest such operation in the nation. But only a fraction, about 15 million cubic yards, is used to rebuild coastal marshes and wetlands that have been disappearing at the rate of 24 square miles a year.

The remainder of the dredged material is wasted, to the disappointment of state officials, conservationists and some within the corps who would like to see the mud used to help reverse a century of erosion.

from the Times Picayune

Hurricane Rita research shows progress, obstacles

Southwest Louisiana is rebounding from Hurricane Rita "at a remarkable pace" but still faces daunting health care, housing and work force problems, according to a report released by two McNeese State University researchers.

The report was commissioned by the Louisiana Recovery Authority, the panel created by Gov. Kathleen Blanco to handle the state's recovery from Rita and Hurricane Katrina. It documents the damage Rita caused in parishes ranging from Terrebonne to Calcasieu, with chapters focusing on destruction and recovery in the hardest hit: Cameron, Calcasieu and Vermilion
from The Times Picayune

Time to Move the Mississippi, Experts Say

Scientists have long said the only way to restore Louisiana’s vanishing wetlands is to undo the elaborate levee system that controls the Mississippi River, not with the small projects that have been tried here and there, but with a massive diversion that would send the muddy river flooding wholesale into the state’s sediment-starved marshes.

And most of them have long dismissed the idea as impractical, unaffordable and lethal to the region’s economy. Now, they are reconsidering. In fact, when a group of researchers convened last April to consider the fate of the Louisiana coast, their recommendation was unanimous: divert the river.

Far from rejecting the idea, state officials have embraced it, motivated not just by the lessons of Hurricane Katrina but also by growing fears that global climate change will bring rising seas, accelerating land loss and worse weather.

“A major diversion in the lower part of the river is something that needs to be done,” said James R. Hanchey, deputy secretary of the Louisiana Department of Natural Resources. He said the state was convening a planning meeting on the idea this fall. The diversion would be well downstream of New Orleans, in the bird-foot delta at the river’s mouth. Even so, there would be tremendous engineering challenges, particularly in finding a new way for freighters to make their way into the Mississippi’s shipping channel, said Mr. Hanchey, who took his job after retiring as director of engineering and technical services for the Mississippi Valley division of the Army Corps of Engineers. But he added, “I think it’s within the realm of possibility.”

from the NY Times

Need for house gutting seems endless in N.O.

The telephone at New Orleans ACORN has been ringing off the hook.

Stephen Bradberry, head organizer of the nonprofit community service agency, said his office has received about 1,000 requests for the free house-gutting service offered by ACORN since he went on the radio in late August to talk about the program. The thousand requests are on top of the 1,000 or so homes that were already on the organization's waiting list for gutting -- a full year's work, Bradberry said -- with applications still being accepted.

from The Times Picayune

Renewal Money for New Orleans Bypasses Renters

As billions in housing aid begins to flow here in the next few weeks, most of it will go to homeowners, who have been appointed by city officials as the true architects of this city’s recovery, despite the fact that roughly half the city’s residents rented housing before Hurricane Katrina.
from The New York Times

Business interruption insurance claims could account for half of the commercial losses from Katrina, many owners are still struggling to get payments

When the twin towers of the World Trade Center came down in the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks and the surrounding area of the city was destroyed, New York lost an expensive piece of real estate, costing the insurance industry billions.

But what may come as a surprise is that the largest single source of insurance payout in the terrorist attacks was not the property claims, but business interruption insurance.
from The Times Picayune

New Orleans suicide rate may be up

New Orleans' suicide rate appears to have gone up in the first six months after Hurricane Katrina evacuees were allowed back home, but the increase could be due to chance instead of post-storm depression, a study by Louisiana's epidemiologist says.
from The Houston Chronicle

Ivorian toxic victim numbers soar

Residents of the biggest city, Abidjan, have been reporting health problems, including headaches and vomiting, since a ship offloaded tons of waste. These were dumped by a local company in leaking drums on open-air sites. Four of the six dead are children. Last week the entire government resigned over the pollution scandal. The UN has set up an inter-agency team and the Ivorians have recruited extra medical staff to deal with the crisis.

"There were a total of 15,749 consultations by yesterday evening," health ministry spokesman Simeon N'Da told AFP news agency. "Of these, 23 people have been hospitalised and six have died." A French team is analysing the waste and says it will produce a report by the end of this week.

from the BBC

Humans 'causing stronger storms'

Scientists calculate that two-thirds of the recent rise in sea temperatures, thought to fuel hurricanes, is down to anthropogenic emissions. Research published last year found there had been a sharp rise in the incidence of category 4 and 5 storms - the strongest - in recent decades. But other scientists caution there may be errors in historical storm records. Hurricane formation is strongly linked to sea-surface temperature, with warmer waters more likely to form storms.

Sea-surface temperature and hurricane strength vary naturally, and deciphering a clear impact of human greenhouse gas emissions has been difficult. However, the last two years have seen several major pieces of research which have at least increased understanding of the issue, without settling it conclusively.

from the BBC

New Orleans Health

The radio show Living on Earth interviews Dr Gina Solomon, of the National Resouces Defense Council, about health problems in New Orleans since Hurricane Katrina. A contrasting view from the Environmental Protection Agency is included.

read the transcript or listen to the story

Rio Grande Levees Need Massive Repairs

Twelve-foot-high earthen berms stretching 100 miles along the Rio Grande in South Texas were built decades ago to protect the region's irrigated farms and citrus groves from floods. But now a four-county region known as the Valley, with a growing population of 1.3 million, risks flooding again because of levee erosion.
from AP via Forbes

69% of poor evacuees are here to stay

Houston may be hot, unfriendly and frustratingly difficult to navigate, but more than two-thirds of the poorest New Orleans evacuees who fled to the city after Hurricane Katrina plan to stay, a Rice University survey released today shows.

from The Houston Chronicle

Thousands tour modular open house

At the open house for the new, yellow two-story home in Lakeview, the curious opened closet doors and kitchen cabinets, peered into bedrooms and bathrooms and looked up at the high ceilings.

But what set apart the open house at 5915 West End Blvd. and drew thousands over the weekend was that it showcased a modular home erected in only seven weeks.

Modular homes, built in a factory by sections and assembled onsite, offer a relatively quick approach to home-building. The company that built the West End house, New Era Homes, aims to appeal to post-Katrina buyers who don't want to take on the months-long effort involved in the traditional approach to rebuilding.

Visitors to the West End house wanted to know things like what appliances come with the house and how long it takes for a home like it to be built, as well as cost and square footage.

Some were in the market for a new house while others came out of curiosity. Most marveled that the house looked "stick-built," or built the old-fashioned way, rather than pre-made in a Austin, Texas, factory.

from the Times Picayune

Coastal defenses

The BBC has a page with graphics explaining proposed changes to the levee system and a map of population change in the greater New Orleans area since the storm.

from the BBC online

Interview: Katrina Lessons Learned

In an exclusive interview with United Press International, Craig Vanderwagen, assistant secretary for public health emergency preparedness at the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), discusses lessons learned after the devastation wrought by last year's Hurricane Katrina, and some of the changes that his agency has already made as a new rash of tropical storms brew in the shadow of the Gulf Coast.

from UPI

Tree-Planting Drive Seeks To Bring a New Urban Cool

Sacramento believes an answer for global warming is growing on trees.

About 375,000 shade trees have been given away to city residents in the past 16 years, and there are plans to plant at least 4 million more. To receive up to 10 free trees, residents simply call the Sacramento Municipal Utility District, a publicly owned power company.

"A week later, they are here to tell you where the trees should be planted and how to take care of them," said Arlene Willard, a retired welfare case worker who with her husband, John, has planted four SMUD trees in the back yard of their east Sacramento house.

Perhaps the most arresting feature of Sacramento's shade crusade is its rarity, despite federal research showing that carefully planted trees can lower summertime temperatures in cities, significantly reduce air-conditioning bills and trap greenhouse gases responsible for global warming.

from the Washington Post

For evacuees, distance may be key

Among the scattered New Orleanians who long for home, Kathleen Lambert-Scott and Theresa Hughes represent two divergent groups whose lives in the past year may forecast the city's future population.

Each woman sorely misses her old life in Gentilly and has vowed to rebuild it eventually. But Lambert-Scott staked her family's temporary home 50 miles away in her rural hometown of Sorrento, while Hughes rented an apartment 400 miles away in Memphis.

Lambert-Scott, 42, kept her partnership in a downtown New Orleans law firm by committing to a grueling three-hour round-trip commute as she and her husband pursue plans to build a new home on their old lot. Hughes, 53, had a job offer in New Orleans from the U.S. Postal Service, but she turned it down because she felt she could not afford the area's high rents.

The year's frustrations have worn on both women, but there's a difference. Living within an hour's drive of home, Lambert-Scott speaks with optimism about her block on Pratt Drive coming back to life. Hughes describes her life as "waiting it out" from afar.

Though scores of factors will keep the future face of the city uncertain for years, demographers say the people most likely to become New Orleans residents again are already staging their return from the city's suburbs and a corridor extending to Baton Rouge.

from the Times Picayune

A Bank Survives Katrina. Now, the Hard Part

To reach the executive suite of the Liberty Bank and Trust Company here, you first have to navigate a stretch of town that still lacks street signs. Finding an entrance to the bank’s headquarters is another challenge. You have to circle behind the building, a six-story glass box that is still missing several windows, and — as if there to work on the plumbing — walk up a set of corrugated steel steps sandwiched between a Dumpster and an oversized air-conditioning unit.

After traversing a bare room that smells of mildew and walking past three disabled elevators, you trudge up five more flights of steel stairs to reach the office of Alden J. McDonald Jr., the chief executive of this institution, which was the country’s third-largest black-owned bank until Hurricane Katrina and floodwaters roared through New Orleans one year ago.

Mr. McDonald and his staff count themselves among the fortunate, despite the general state of disrepair inside and outside their building. While their neighborhood wants for many basic amenities, including mail delivery and phone service, their company is one of the few enterprises back in business in the vast northeastern quadrant of New Orleans. And in a city where an estimated two in three businesses remain shuttered, Liberty is not only open but also turning a profit.

from the NY Times

Commander of the Army's Corps of Engineers reviews Katrina

The commander of the Army's Corps of Engineers conceded that bad levee design and other factors within its responsibility contributed to the flooding of New Orleans during Hurricane Katrina, but refused to accept all the blame heaped on by critics.

"I haven't enjoyed being the first commander to have to account for the Corps' actions in 200 years, but it was the right thing to do," Lt. Gen. Carl Strock said Thursday. "We have to show people that we are accountable for our actions."

from the AP via Newsday

FEMA approves disaster declaration for NM

The Federal Emergency Management Agency will make disaster aid available to several New Mexico counties that suffered flooding from recent storms.

Publicly owned facilities in Cibola, Doña Ana, Luna, Valencia, Otero, Socorro and Lincoln counties will be eligible for public assistance covering at least 75 percent of the cost to repair, replace or restore infrastructure.

Homeowners and renters in Doña Ana County whose housing was affected by storms also will be eligible for personal assistance. In addition, residents in all New Mexico counties are eligible to apply for hazard mitigation assistance to prevent or reduce long-term risk to life and property from natural hazards.

from New Mexico Business Weekly"

Pitt shows "green" New Orleans housing design

Actor Brad Pitt on Thursday unveiled a "green" housing design for New Orleans's Lower Ninth Ward and said he was appalled by the slow pace of rebuilding since Hurricane Katrina hit last year.

Two New York City architects won a contest, underwritten by Pitt, for an affordable, environmentally sound housing design.

Their complex of single family homes and apartments would be built from modular pieces into long houses on a site that connects to the neighboring Mississippi River levee with a wide pedestrian ramp.

But Pitt said the recovery would not work if the city did not assure critical services such as schools, and that he did not see much progress in the area that needed it most.


"I am appalled and embarrassed that residents still do not have the opportunity ... to decide if they want to get back into their neighborhoods and recreate their communities," Pitt told a news conference.

from Reuters