Citation

Barbier EB. Nature 2015; 524(7565): 285-287.

Affiliation

University of Wyoming in Laramie, Wyoming, USA. His book Nature and Wealth: Overcoming Environmental Scarcity and Inequality will be published this year.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2015, Holtzbrinck Springer Nature Publishing Group)

DOI

10.1038/524285a

PMID

26289191

Abstract

Ten years ago, Hurricane Katrina devastated the US Gulf coast states. It caused around US$110 billion in damages, more than 1,800 deaths, and displaced 1.2 million people.

The disaster led to a rethink of the management of the Gulf coastline. In the seven decades preceding 2005, Louisiana had lost coastal lands, mainly marshes, totalling around 4,900 square kilometres — an area the size of Trinidad and Tobago. Following the hurricane, the President's Gulf Coast Ecosystem Restoration Task Force recommended extensive wetland re-establishment, noting that they “provide a natural flood attenuation function”.

After the hurricane season in 2005, the Louisiana state legislature created the Coastal Protection Restoration Authority (CPRA) and tasked it with coordinating the local, state and federal efforts. The CPRA embarked on five-year coastal master plans to guide policymakers in developing a more sustainable coast....

Language: en