coastal restoration

Louisiana leaders broke ground on the Mid-Barataria Sediment Diversion project on Aug. 10, 2023, but construction on the project has been delayed. Two separate lawsuits are challenging the impacts it could have on the state’s coastline. Louisiana is in danger of losing the more than $2 billion allocated for the project if it doesn’t commit to seeing it through.

Louisiana could be out billions of dollars if controversial coastal restoration stalls

The feds threaten to withhold $2.2 billion from the massive effort to save and restore the state’s diminishing coastline if leaders don’t act soon.

An aerial view of broken wetlands in Plaquemines Parish. Projections by Climate Central indicate that the parish could lose another 100,000 acres of wetlands by the end of the century.

Coastal Desk

Louisiana voters want federal money from offshore wind to go toward coastal restoration

Eva Tesfaye

Louisiana’s coastal restoration fund could get a boost from offshore wind revenues.

The Mississippi River-Gulf Outlet, a man-made navigational channel connecting the Gulf of Mexico to New Orleans, is deemed a critical protection asset for the greater New Orleans area, and in 2017 was added to the list of restoration projects identified by the Louisiana Coastal Protection and Restoration Authority.

Coastal Desk

As funding dries up for Louisiana’s coastal restoration program, advocates are strategizing to sustain it

Terry L. Jones (Floodlight)

A coalition of environmental groups is pushing 18 projects to protect Gulf Coast communities from land loss and storm damage.

The Louisiana Capitol on April 4, 2023, in Baton Rouge, La.

Coastal Desk

1,400 bills later, how did Louisiana's environment fare after the 2024 legislative session?

Eva Tesfaye

The wide-ranging session included the passage of numerous bills with significant environmental implications

Submerged aquatic vegetation, a key indicator of freshwater marsh health, is in abundance in the waters of Bay Denesse on Sept. 12, 2022, where efforts to cut small crevasses and build terraces have led to new land. Bay Denesse connects to the new, larger Mississippi River crevasse known as Neptune Pass on Plaquemines Parish's east bank.

Coastal Desk

As clock ticks down, advocates urge state to find new funding for coastal restoration

Halle Parker

Billions of dollars in procured from oil giant BP has been the main source of coastal restoration funding. But that money is set to run out in 2031. A new brief pushes urgency.

Glass Half Full and Tulane University volunteers push a wagon of river sand mixed with glass sand down a makeshift pier to start building new islands in Bayou Bienvenue on March 9, 2024.

Coastal Desk

To restore ‘ghost swamp,’ St. Bernard project relies on an unlikely hero: glass bottles

Halle Parker

Glass Half Full plans to build two new islands in Bayou Bienvenue using a mix of river sand and recycled glass. The project will use over 120 cubic yards of recycled glass sand, the equivalent of more than a half-million beer bottles.

A Gulf Shores High School student counts the number of oysters in a cluster at the Little Lagoon Preservation Society’s oyster gardens in Gulf Shores, Alabama, on Feb. 9, 2024.

Coastal Desk

From sea to table to sea: How recycled oyster shells are restoring the Alabama coast

Danny McArthur

Gulf South oyster reefs are fading because of the changing climate. Alabama hopes to reverse this by using recycled shells to grow oyster gardens.

Scientists with the Water Insitute of the Gulf, a Baton Rouge-based research not-for-profit, release liquid nitrogen into the ground in a salt marsh near Port Fourchon to study the marsh's ability to store carbon.

Coastal Desk

Louisiana marshes bury carbon in the muck. Could they help fight climate change?

Halle Parker

Marshes can act as “carbon sinks.” Louisiana researchers want to figure out how big a role they can play in the fight against climate change.

Coastal Protection and Restoration Authority Board Chairman Chip Kline speaks at the Bayou Chene Floodgate ceremony in April 2022.

Coastal Desk

Louisiana top coastal official resigns in final months of Edwards’ term

Halle Parker

Louisiana’s top coastal restoration official declared his plans to resign during a speech at one of the state’s largest coastal conferences on Wednesday. Louisiana Coastal Protection and Restoration Authority chairman Chip Kline marks the latest of Gov. John Bel Edwards’ appointees to step down from their position as the Democratic governor’s term nears its close in January 2024.

Excavators roll over newly built land on Louisiana's Spanish Pass restoration site in 2022, attempting to reverse some of the land loss in Barataria Bay.

Coastal Desk

Levees, oil wells biggest causes of Barataria Basin land loss: study

Mark Schleifstein, Times-Picayune/The Advocate

A new study of the dramatic loss of wetlands in the Barataria Basin south of New Orleans during the last 130 years concludes that the two main causes have been construction of levees along the Mississippi River and subsidence due to oil and gas activity.But the study also contains potential good news: There may be enough sediment in the river to rebuild coastal land, disputing earlier estimates.