C: That very well could be the case. I haven't heard anything about that specifically, but I know there was damage caused by the storm.
M: What part do the oil companies play in this problem?
C: Well, right now there's a lot of canals they're not using, that they use for exploration and for piping resources that they've already taken and that they leave open, and that allows the saltwater to intrude into those wetlands and kill a lot of the marsh flora that exist there.
M: Once the saltwater gets into the marshes and bayous, it's an all-downhill sort of thing?
C: Pretty much. There's a short period of time where you can mitigate the impact, but it's very, very limited and also, when they dredge these canals, they have what they call "spill banks" which are the leftover sediment that they try to make sort of temporary levees. What happens is when these storm surges come in, they're funneled and channeled into these canals. They spill over, and then they get into the wetlands that are behind these spill banks and that causes further erosion. Our estimates for the oil and gas companies (responsibility) would be about 40 to 60% of the wetlands losses suffered since the 1960s or so.
M: Wow. Are you working with universities?
C: Absolutely! I'm actually the campus organizer for the Gulf Restoration Network, and what we do, on campuses is that we go and present the different information to classes, be it from sociology to biology to chemistry, pretty much anyone who would be interested in the scientific or the advocacy area of our work, and then we have internships available where they assist on donor campaigns, campaign organizing, community outreach, research and a number of other things on a wide range of issues.
M: How does global warming relate to the local problems?
C: Well locally you know, first of all, you have the rise in sea level which, with a lot of Southern Louisiana at sea level or below sea level, naturally plays a part in saltwater intrusion as well as magnifying the intensity of hurricanes, the frequency of large hurricanes, as well as how far a storm surge can go because it's kind of that vicious cycle where the salt water is intruding, it's killing wetlands more rapidly, also the sea level rise which is allowing more water to be readily available to be pushed inland from storm surge.
M: You had said something earlier about asking the governors in the area to get involved in confronting global warming.
C: Yes, that's one of our campaign issues right now. Our global climate change staffer, Casey DeMoss Roberts, is putting together a (proposal), focusing now on getting Governor Jindal to bring up, in the Gulf of Mexico Alliance, which is made up of all the Gulf state governors, to make global climate change a priority issue for the region, because right now it's not and we think that's a mistake, because we are already starting to see the impacts of climate change, and we have to prepare for those ones that we're fairly certain are going to occur, as well as to begin mitigating our impact, our contributions to global climate change.
M: Are you in contact with any of the countries in the Caribbean? Are any of the countries in the Caribbean trying to do anything like you're trying to advise?
C: Not that I'm aware of right now. We're focused mainly on the United States, but there are Caribbean countries as well as Latin American countries that share the Gulf of Mexico.
M: Well, that's a lot of good information right now, so thank you for that.
C: Well thank you very much. I appreciate the opportunity to get this information out there.
If you want to learn more about the Gulf Restoration Network, or even get involved with them as a volunteer or intern, or become a member or donate a few bucks, go to http://healthygulf.org/.
