For more information

Websites:

USGS, Coastal and Marine Geology Program
http://marine.usgs.gov

USGS, National Wetlands Research Center
http://www.nwrc.usgs.gov

Publications:

Williams, S.J., and Stewart, R., 1996, Understanding coastal wetland processes: Geotimes, v. 41, no. 7, p. 18-22.

Williams, S.J., Stone, G.W., and Burruss, A.E., 1997, A perspective on the Louisiana wetland loss and coastal erosion problem: Journal of Coastal Research, v. 13, no. 3, p. 593-597.

Helping Protect, Restore Louisiana's Coast

Most U.S. coastal areas, like other coastal regions around the world, are under increasing stress from natural processes such as erosion, storms, sediment deficits, subsidence, rising sea level, and the effects of human population growth and development.

Coastal regions now contain more than 50 percent of the U.S. population and are greatly used for recreation, transportation, and oil and gas extraction. Coastal wetlands, estuaries, and barrier islands not only buffer the inland from storms and flooding, but also provide critical habitat for fish and wildlife.

Unfortunately, 80 percent of the Nation's coastal regions are undergoing long-term erosion. Louisiana leads the Nation, and likely the world, in area lost to coastal erosion and wetland deterioration.

Louisiana contains 40 percent of the coastal wetlands in the lower 48 States. These wetlands support a harvest of renewable natural resources like seafood with an annual value exceeding $1 billion. At the same time, Louisiana also has the highest rates of coastal wetlands loss: 80 percent of the Nation's total loss of coastal wetlands.

According to mapping studies and measurements by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and the USGS, approximately 1,000 - 1,500 square miles of coastal wetlands in Louisiana have been eroded or converted to open water in the past half century, and, if current rates of wetland loss continue, an equal amount may be lost over the next 50 years. This land loss is due to a complex combination of natural factors and human activities such as flood control, navigation channels, and energy development, severely affecting the State's economy and directly increasing storm and flooding threats to New Orleans and surrounding urban areas.

The USGS Coastal and Marine Geology Program and National Wetlands Research Center, with other Federal agencies and local universities, are scientifically assessing Louisiana's rapid coastal erosion, wetlands loss, and environmental changes, as well as quantifying and providing a better understanding of the natural and human processes responsible.

Shrimp boats harvest a valuable resource that depends on coastal wetlands for part of the shrimp life cycle.

Results from these studies are providing base-line information in the Federal-State wetlands restoration underway, funded through the Coastal Wetlands Planning, Protection and Restoration Act of 1992. This $40 million a year effort consists of small-scale restoration across the entire Mississippi River Deltaic Plain; there are plans for multi-billion dollar major diversions of the Mississippi River and for sand nourishment of the barrier islands.

In addition to providing scientific information useful in implementing the restoration projects, the USGS has helped develop monitoring plans and is monitoring water and sediment fluxes for use in measuring the success of restoration projects.

Wetlands restoration in Louisiana is an example of Federal-State collaboration to enhance a degraded ecosystem and a demonstration of the value of linking scientific studies with coastal management. Louisiana is a model for similar efforts across the Nation.

Before (left) and after (right) restoration of the LaBranch wetland site just west of New Orleans, Louisiana, and adjacent to the Mississippi River. This is an example of a successful restoration being monitored by the USGS.