Contact: Gordon Helm FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
(301) 713-2370 3/28/95
Three restoration projects totalling $6.1 million will soon be implemented to protect more than 15,000 acres of threatened Louisiana coastal wetlands, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's National Marine Fisheries Service announced today.
The projects are the Bayou Perot/Bayou Rigolettes Marsh Restoration Project, the Lake Chapeau Sediment Input and Hydrologic Restoration Project, and the East Timbalier Island Coastal Wetlands Restoration Project.
The Bayou Perot/Bayou Rigolettes Marsh Restoration Project
A coastal wetlands restoration project will be implemented near Jefferson Parish at a 4,255 acre intermediate-to-brackish marsh peninsula located between Bayou Perot and Bayou Rigolettes. The goal of this $1.8 million project is to protect the Perot- Rigolettes peninsula by preventing erosion and creating a buffer marsh around its perimeter. To achieve this, project workers will stabilize the shoreline with dredged materials. The shoreline restoration is expected to protect approximately 1,065 acres of marsh and 392 acres of submerged aquatic vegetation over a twenty-year period.
Erosion rates in this area are among the most severe in the state. Almost 60 acres of marsh are lost each year due to sediment starvation, subsidence, saltwater intrusion and tidal scouring. The peninsula currently loses an average of 30 feet of shoreline per year. If no action were taken to prevent its erosion, the peninsula would disappear in less than 20 years, leaving marshes in the upper Barataria Basin vulnerable to increased destruction by saltwater intrusion and tidal activity from the Gulf of Mexico.
Lake Chapeau Sediment Input and Hydrologic Restoration Project
The National Marine Fisheries Service and the state of Louisiana are implementing a coastal wetlands restoration project in Lake Chapeau, located on Point Au Fer Island in Terrebone Parish. Point Au Fer Island has lost about 30 percent of its land area since the 1930s as a result of subsidence, erosion and the effects of construction of oil and gas canals. While the rate of wetlands loss on the island as a whole is decreasing because of sediment input from the Atchafalaya River, the Lake Chapeau area is losing marsh as a result of altered tidal circulation through the northern part of the island. The circulation is made possible by the many natural and manmade waterways in this area, as well as large areas of open water and broken marsh. Major marsh loss has occurred in the area surrounding Lake Chapeau and continues at a rate of nearly 15 acres per year.
The $2.9 million restoration project will include mining 500,000 cubic yards of sediment from the Atchafalaya Bay bottom, spray-jetting the sediment over a 1,800 acre area along Lake Chapeauþs shorelines, and installing numerous plugs in abandoned oil and gas access canals. The project will restore marshes west of Lake Chapeau, reestablish the hydrologic separation of the Locust Bayou and Alligator Bayou watersheds, and reestablish the natural drainage patterns in the Lake Chapeau area. More than 260 acres of open water will be converted to marsh. Reducing open water areas and filling shallow breaks in the marsh will protect 2,500 acres from wind-wave erosion and an additional 1,000 acres from tidal scour. Plugging man-made canals and gapping spoil banks will restore natural sediment delivery pathways, enhancing 12,000 acres of wetlands.
East Timbalier Island Coastal Wetlands Restoration Project
Louisiana and NMFS will be implementing a wetlands restoration project on Lafourche Parish's East Timbalier Island, which covers only 400 acres and is rapidly eroding from intense human disturbance, sea level rise, geologic subsidence, and gulf storm waves. The restoration project will utilize 890,000 cubic yards of material dredged from nearshore sand deposits and inshore oil field access canals to create 88 acres of intertidal wetlands. The first of two phases to restore the island, this project will strengthen the island and provide continued fisheries, wildlife, and storm prevention to the inhabitants of south Louisiana. The project is designed to reinforce the vital interior marshes of the island and provide prolonged protection to an additional 1,900 acres of coastal wetlands within the Timbalier Bay estuarine system. Cost is estimated at $1.4 million, with construction to begin in late 1995.
The three projects are funded by the Coastal Wetlands Planning, Protection and Restoration Act. The Act mandated the organization of a task force consisting of five federal agencies and the state of Louisiana. The task force currently is coordinating the implementation of almost 60 projects aimed at mitigating Louisianaþs severe coastal erosion and wetlands loss. Funding for the projects totals approximately $35 million annually. The National Marine Fisheries Service is the primary task force participant for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, and its parent agency, the Department of Commerce.