Posted on 06/23/2017 8:57:11 PM PDT by Lorianne
That Louisiana is sinking into the Gulf of Mexico is not news. Rising seas and coastline erosion have been working together for decades, but this sinking may well be happening faster than previously thought—threatening billions and billions of Louisiana oil infrastructure.
This is the central idea of a new study from Tulane University that set out to map the Louisiana coastline using new methods of measuring subsidence—the technical term for sinking land. The outcome of the measurements is an average 9 mm of wetlands lost to the sea every year. This compares to previous estimates of an annual subsidence rate between 1 to 6 mm.
The authors warn that there are differences in the rate of sinking at different locations along the coast, but overall, we are already seeing what other authors in earlier studies have estimated as the worst-case scenario for the future.
There is grim irony in the fact that according to the Tulane University researchers, the main reason for the accelerated sinking is the loss of sediment carried by the Mississippi River to the coast because of the numerous levees aimed at protecting cities and industrial infrastructure from flooding. Now, Gulf waters are advancing, and it is making flood threats more serious as natural defenses such as marshes are being swallowed by the sea. So is oil infrastructure.
(Excerpt) Read more at oilprice.com ...
So it will take another million yeas before it sinks?
Cool your jets, sweetheart. Oil companies employ lots and lots of smart people, even smarter than you. The oil companies will figure out the remedies necessary well in advance of you running out of power.
I have not been impressed with Oil Price.
There’s something to be said about “Necessity being the Mother of Invention”
These doomsayers have no clue about what people can or will do to solve problems.
Actually all of the Mississippi Delta is less than 10,000 years old. I am pretty certain there is some very interesting human artifacts and settlements that are buried under the 350 feet of sediment deposited since the end of the ice age. 10,000 years ago sea levels were 350 feet lower than today and we all know that most cities are near the coasts along rivers.
They do need a way to get sediment from the river to start rebuilding the delta but this is pure alarmism by nerds looking for government grants.
The river wants to go to Morgan City, but we won’t let it.
So it would take thirty years for one foot of coastline to recede. If levees receded at that rate, they would add more dirt. So three feet in a long human lifetime is almost not enough to notice. Also it doesn't account for the natural erosion that happens just because of regular weather. Which, if I read this correctly, would be about half of the new, improved rate.
Start pumping faster...
Major pipelines from under-water to under land, heading far inland from the Gulf, and moving refineries to far more northern terminus of those pipelines, and out of bearing the brunt of Hurricanes and Mississippi gulf subsidence would be good “infrastructure” investments”. Fueling supply tankers from the refineries could move in the opposite direction to tankers anchored in the Gulf.
Free the Big Muddy!
[[but this sinking may well be happening faster than previously thought—threatening billions and billions of Louisiana oil infrastructure.]]
At which point we’ll just have to convert the wells to undersea ones- no big deal- plenty of time to prepare
Subsiding, Not receding.
“.....Rising seas......”
Um, no.
Well, that settles it. Those nasty levees and dams that support human life are fighting mother nature so humans must leave for gaia’s sake.
Or we could dump dirt like Dubai and make pretty islands
They are suggesting spending billions to restore what was originally there, namely marshes that protected the delta from erosion.
Yes, we can do lots of things but nature bats last.
IMO, there should be a number of spillway gates in the river levees downriver of New Orleans, to periodically allow river water and silt to be carried out into the marshy areas that are currently “sinking”. Currently, all that sediment is being ejected out into the Mississippi Sound.
Levees have a lot to do with the sinking state. The silt is channeled out into the gulf far enough that it does not add to the delta. The river is prevented from changing course which it did periodically in days of yore and distributed the silt better and built up the coast. Loss of NO would put a terrific crimp in the national economy way beyond the loss of oil rigs and refineries as it is the port that sends out the products of the entire Mississippi Basin which is the entire midwest. Transport to NO by water is easy and much cheaper than transport by truck and train to the West Coast or Norfolk or New York.
If my quick math is right that means they will lose a foot of wetlands in 30+ years.
Look at decadal geographic maps of the coast for the last only half century. There is a hell of a lot more water in Southern LA now than there was in 1984, when I traveled about the area.
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