BATON ROUGE — You may have heard the well-worn statistic that Louisiana loses one football field’s worth of marsh every hour, but you probably didn’t know that the state’s official “coastal zone” is expected to grow this year.

Fast facts about coastal zone

- Nearly half Louisiana’s population lives in coastal parishes.

- More than half of the state’s annual revenues are generated in the coastal zone.

- Five of the Top 15-tonnage ports in the U.S. depend on the coastal zone.

- About 26 percent of the oil and 26 percent of the natural gas used by the nation flow through Louisiana.

- Louisiana has been the top producer in the lower 48 states in fisheries, and the top producer in the nation of oysters, blue crabs and crawfish.

Source: Louisiana Department of Natural Resources

The area includes the 19 parishes that make up the federal- and state-recognized coastal zone program.

The coastal-zone designation can be important to parishes because it makes them eligible for loans, grants and other resources.

The state’s Coastal Protection and Restoration Authority is considering a set of recommendations that would alter the assistance program, including a sizable expansion of the zone’s inland boundary.

Under the proposal, Terrebonne and Lafourche parishes would have an additional 854 square miles added to the program.

If approved by the CPRA, the proposal would set into motion the first real changes to Louisiana’s coastal zone in more than three decades.

The most significant part of the proposal calls for making Ascension the 20th parish in the coastal zone, specifically 52 square miles.

The state Legislature and Gov. Bobby Jindal endorsed the inclusion earlier this year, but also suggested portions of Iberville Parish, which didn’t make the cut in the science-based review of the zone completed last week by the Office of Coastal Management.

The recommendations under consideration by the CPRA can be found in the study, which was requested by lawmakers in 2009.

Rep. Gordon Dove, R-Houma, chairman of the House Natural Resources Committee, said parishes should be added to the coastal zone only after careful study.

While other parishes may want to join, he said all should be reviewed by the same standards.

“Or next thing you know we’ll have Caddo Parish in the coastal zone,” Dove said.

Overall, the CPRA additions would mean 2,000 more square miles for the coastal zone.

Aside from Ascension, nine other already-zoned parishes make up for the bulk of the increase, including Assumption, Calcasieu, Cameron, Iberia, Lafourche, St. Mary, St. Martin and Terrebonne.

Livingston Parish would lose 144 square miles under the proposed changes, and Tangipahoa’s area would be decreased by 50 square miles.

State Sen. Norby Chabert, D-Houma, a member of the Senate Natural Resources Committee, said the 294 square miles being added in Terrebonne and 560 in Lafourche are long overdue.

“There are actually parts of Chauvin not included in the coastal zone,” he said, “so the fact that we’re gaining area is a good thing.”

As for whether the other new areas will mean fewer dollars for the Terrebonne-Lafourche region, Chabert said he’s taking a wait-and-see approach.

Ascension, though, deserves to be in the mix, he added.

“They experience flooding problems just like we do,” Chabert said.

Louis Buatt, assistant secretary of the Office of Coastal Management, said the report was conducted over the course of about one year.

The state put up $100,000 and the federal government provided $342,000.

Before it was handed over to the CPRA last Wednesday, the study had been running behind schedule for most of the year.

In fact, lawmakers adopted legislation in the spring asking that Ascension be included in the coastal zone, but it was contingent upon the findings of the study.

“With the unprecedented levels of support and attention this issue has gained at the state and national level, we must ensure that our approach to managing the coast is not only based in science and takes into account the critical social, cultural and economic aspects of the coastal area,” Buatt said, “but that we are targeting the right areas of the state in the most appropriate way.”

Since the coastal zone boundary was originally set in 1978, just six years after the federal government created the framework for the program, Buatt said Louisiana has seen changes in land and water, erosion has advanced and hurricanes have wrought drastic changes.

Plus, technology and science are operating on different levels, he said.

Original Article

The state hired the Dallas law firm of Baron and Budd PC and local lawyer Burton LeBlanc as it pursues damages in the BP oil disaster.

Attorney General Buddy Caldwell announced the legal contract, which will pay the firm up to $500,000 over a three-year period.

Attorneys will be paid a maximum $400 an hour depending on their years of legal experience.

Meanwhile, a contract with a New Orleans law firm hired earlier to represent the state   has skyrocketed in the last two months from a maximum $4,000 to $779,000 over a three-year period.

Environmental lawyer Bradley Marten, of Seattle, will represent the state through the firm Kanner and Whiteley, according to Caldwell spokeswoman Jennifer Roche.

Marten will be paid $600 an hour, she said.

Baron and Budd already represents businesses hurt by the Gulf oil leak and is seeking other clients via its website.

The firm will provide an evaluation of environmental and economic damage resulting the Gulf oil disaster that started with the April 20 explosion at BP’s Deepwater Horizon rig, Caldwell’s office said in a news release.

Eleven workers died in the explosion and the rig collapse began what is being called the worst environmental disaster in U.S. history.

Baron and Budd’s assessment will be presented to BP as the state seeks to recover natural resource damages pursuant to the Federal Oil Pollution Act and the Louisiana Oil Spill Prevention and Response Act, Caldwell’s office said.

Caldwell did not respond to a request made through his press office for comment.

LeBlanc is an environmental legal specialist who leads Baron and Budd’s Louisiana practice.

Baron and Budd is already involved in oil disaster-related litigation representing Gulf businesses hurt by the oil leak, according to the company’s website.

The website contains a section under the heading “Gulf Coast Oil Spill” in which it discusses potential damages businesses and individuals may be entitled to and notes its lawyers are available to help.

Caldwell’s office previously hired as special counsel in the lawsuit Allan Kanner, of New Orleans; Henry T. Dart, Covington; T. Allen Usry, New Orleans; and E. Wade Shows, Baton Rouge.

Original Article

He targets economy, restoring wetlands

Thursday, July 15, 2010

By Aimee Miles

Staff writer

Gov. Bobby Jindal announced his “Agenda for Revitalizing Coastal Louisiana” on Wednesday, outlining four priority initiatives aimed at restoring fragile wetlands and salvaging the coastal economy.

The governor called for the implementation of a comprehensive coastal restoration plan, a certification process to reopen waters for commercial and recreational fishing, an end to the deepwater drilling moratorium and accountability on the part of BP in paying for the full restoration of Louisiana’s affected ecosystem.

Drawing upon the war-like rhetoric that has inflected his public entreaties to BP and the federal government of late, Jindal stressed a need to eliminate bureaucratic red tape and quickly implement measures that would protect the state’s environmental and economic interests. He was joined by coastal parish presidents, who voiced their support for the agenda.

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The state is requesting $9 billion for coastal restoration, freshwater diversion and flood-protection projects, most authorized by Congress in 2007 under the Louisiana Coastal Area Ecosystem Restoration Plan, be made available as soon as possible. Despite the state’s prior commitment of several hundred million dollars, those projects have been stalled because the federal government has yet to provide its share of the financing, Jindal said.

To secure the necessary money, the state is seeking to tap into $250 million of the money Congress previously appropriated for mitigation funds corresponding with post-Katrina hurricane-protection repairs. The money is meant to cover environmental damage caused by the reconstruction of the levee system around New Orleans.

Louisiana is also requesting an immediate investment from BP to pay for coastal wetlands and recovery initiatives as dictated by the natural resource damage assessment process that the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration developed in the wake of the 1989 Exxon Valdez oil spill.

Finally, the state wants to immediately begin receiving money from the 2006 Gulf of Mexico Energy Security Act, which would allow Louisiana to collect 37.5 percent of revenue from offshore oil and gas production that occurs in federal waters off its coastline. The royalties are scheduled to arrive in 2017. The money can only be used for coastal restoration and protection measures related to the impact of offshore drilling.

Jindal characterized the federal government’s policies as a frequent source of frustration and a barrier to productivity.

“This investment in our coast must be supported by also eliminating federal policies that conflict with coastal-restoration projects,” he said.

If the Army Corps of Engineers used material dredged from southern navigation channels to restore coastal wetlands, rather than dumping it in the deep waters of the Gulf of Mexico, Jindal said, the state could rebuild 12 to 16 miles of coastline each year.

Original Article

Wednesday, July 14, 2010

Just as abused kids often love their daddies anyway, so it is that nothing — not even BP — can break Big Oil’s hold over Louisiana.

We give thanks to Big Oil for putting all that money in our pockets, even though we know deep down that our inheritance is being stolen.

Thus we wail to the heavens about the threat posed by the BP spill to way our way of life — “culture” is on everyone’s lips — but we can’t wait to risk a repeat. In court, in Congress and at tea party rallies Louisiana demands that the rigs immediately resume exploration in the Gulf.

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Prudence might suggest we wait to find out what went wrong on the Deepwater Horizon and give President Barack Obama’s commission time to figure out how to “reduce the risk and mitigate the impact of any future spills that result from offshore drilling.” If another explosion sends oil gushing through the fishing grounds and the wetlands, there won’t be any more need to worry about our culture.

One minute we curse BP for its recklessness. The next we say damn the torpedoes, full speed ahead.

In Louisiana that does make a certain amount of sense, because oil is a large part of our culture too and Obama’s drilling moratorium is certain to cost a huge number of jobs in an economy that is already tottering.

Long-term environmental considerations have taken a back seat to the quick buck ever since Louisiana sold out to Big Oil. Now, the threat of environmental disaster, if the moratorium is lifted, will be immediate. But if it remains in effect, certain economic disaster appears imminent.

Opposition to the moratorium is therefore pretty much unanimous in Louisiana, and U.S. Judge Martin Feldman provided the rationale when ruling in favor of oil industry companies that challenged it. Feldman found that the moratorium was arbitrary and capricious and lacked a scientific justification.

Feldman ruled that it was too much of a leap to impose a blanket moratorium because of a mishap on one rig, enabling politicians to argue that a resumption of deepwater drilling would entail little risk. To believe that, it is necessary to assume BP is the wild man of the oil business and other rigs will be operated with sufficient care to obviate any risk of another major spill.

There is indeed some evidence that BP is the most slapdash company in the business; it has racked up safety violations at a staggering rate. Thus, the argument against the moratorium goes, the spill happened not because deepwater drilling is inherently hazardous but because Deepwater Horizon was a rogue operation.

Maybe it is so, but anyone tempted to trust the oil companies’ sense of environmental responsibility would be well advised to take a tour of the Louisiana marshes. Oil spills, albeit on a smaller scale than Deepwater Horizon, are hardly a rare occurrence.

Still, with BP putting assets up and for sale and facing the possibility of bankruptcy, other oil companies may not need much encouragement to take extra precautions in the Gulf. Deepwater drilling is never going to be risk-free, however, and if this spill is as disastrous as we keep saying it is, any prospect of another one ought to give us the heebie-jeebies. We still have no choice but to trust Big Oil.

We may not have a chance to do so anytime soon, however. Certainly the Obama administration shows no sign of yielding to our pleas to lift the moratorium. To the contrary, with Feldman’s ruling awaiting action by the Court of Appeals, Interior Secretary Ken Salazar up and made an end run by promulgating a second moratorium. Its wording is designed to meet the objections raised in Feldman’s decision enjoining enforcement of the first one, so in effect Salazar is admitting Feldman was right.

So much uncertainty hangs over the Gulf right now that nobody is about to start drilling there for a while yet anyway. But Big Oil will be back to look after us as soon as possible.

Original Article

A recently issued Louisiana attorney general opinion lines up with other assessments that say flowing water — in high demand from natural gas drillers — is under state control.

Drawing water from Red River requires a permit from the Red River Water Way Commission, the document states. The attorney general’s office and the Department of Natural Resources also will review applications.

Attorney General Buddy Caldwell’s April 27 response to questions from state Rep. Thomas Carmody, R-Shreveport, comes after the city agreed to let Haynesville Shale operator Petrohawk Energy Corp. run pipes from the river across Clyde Fant Parkway right of way.

Eventually, companies may have to pay for the water.

In Carmody’s view, opinions such as this will help Louisiana put a price on its water, a public resource.

“It’s interesting that we take it for granted that it’s God given,” said Carmody, whose family works in the industry. “There is a value to it. That’s what the law says.”

From Petrohawk’s perspective, this opinion and others raise “logistical and process-oriented” questions.

“We believe they will be addressed by the proper authorities and we will conduct our business accordingly,” said company spokeswoman Joan Dunlap. “This is a specific example meant to address a larger issue on water management.”

Shreveport’s contract with Petrohawk said the city would make more than $14,000 for the allowance.

“That should not affect us,” city Operational Services Director Mike Strong said about the AG opinion. “It’s just going to affect the companies that are wanting (water).”

Red River Waterway Commission Executive Director Ken Guidry has said he wants to work with oil and gas companies but will “be the guy who says ‘stop’” if they hurt the river.

Caldwell’s decisions essentially have added an extra level of government approval for companies that use hydraulic fracturing to access underground oil and gas deposits. Fracking, the industry term, blasts millions of gallons of water to crack rock formations and release minerals.

The sheer volume of water use can threaten water sources such as underground aquifers. There has been a push from the state to protect Caddo and DeSoto parishes’ Carrizo-Wilcox aquifer, one of the area’s most fragile. Besides using sources such as the Red River Alluvial aquifer system, which is continuously recharged by the river’s surface water, companies are trying out reused water from other businesses, such as paper mills.

Original Article