Have you ever had a week that felt like a month? This week was another one of those for me. As I look back on the past 7 days, I'm amazed at the volume of news created by the oil drilling disaster, and how many moving pieces are at play.
The week started with President Obama's trip to coastal Mississippi, Alabama, and the Florida Panhandle where he ate the seafood, and saw how hard-hit those tourism dependent economies really are. This was his third trip since he first visited back on May 1, and the first time he ventured outside Louisiana. He then returned to Washington, where he gave the first oval office address of his administration. I was on at Louisiana Public Broadcasting with LSU coastal science Professor Ed Overton, and oysterman Mike Voison to respond. You can watch it here, but the overwhelming response from the three of us was that we were underwhelmed.
GRN certainly does not dispute the three priorities the President laid out for the Federal response to BP's deepwater drilling disaster:
Kemp's Ridley hatchling courtesy of Sea Turtle Inc.
Once there were tens of thousands of adult Kemp’s Ridley sea turtles in the Gulf of Mexico. As unbelievable as it sounds, there is a 1947 film that shows an estimated 42,000nesting on one Mexican beach in a single day!
As President Obama prepares to address the nation this evening about the BP drilling disaster, some local New Orleans students at Success Preparatory Academy have a message for him. Second grade Science teacher, Amy Shipley, has been opening up the thoughts and imagination of her students to the importance and wonder of nature and the Gulf ecosystem, as well as the need to protect the environment from tragedies such as what we are experiencing today. This heartwarming and inspiring video is a message, a video letter if you will, to President Obama asking him to protect the fish and wildlife from the oil. Please take a look and share with your friends far and wide.
Special thanks to videographer Randy Perez of Timecode: NOLA who produced the video.
Jonathan Henderson is the Coastal Resiliency Organizer for GRN
Everyone's a bit on edge here on the Gulf Coast as we enter day 56 of BP's oil drilling disaster. The known impacts to wildlife and people continue to grow, and more and more questions are gnawing at us.
What will all these dispersants in the water do? Why aren't workers being given respirators and safety equipment? How many oiled pelicans, dolphins, and whales aren't being found? Why aren't we seeing more cleanup?
"Episode 3: Wildlife in distress and dispersants" of GRN's ongoing Youtube video series Gulf Tides: Monitoring BP's Oil Drilling Disaster, features underwater images of dispersed oil, oiled brown pelicans and shots of wetlands affected by BP's crude. You'll also see interviews with locals like Clint Guidry of the Louisiana Shrimp Association and commercial fisherman Raymond "Bozo" Couture.
As GRN works to document what is happening in the Gulf, we are also pushing the government to federalize the response and mobilize more resources for cleanup activities while holding BP financially accountable.
BP's damage to the Gulf will likely take decades to understand and mitigate, and it is sadly only the most recent and acute affront to Louisiana's coastal ecosystem in the pursuit of dirty energy. Of the football field of wetlands lost in the state every 45 minutes, forty to sixty percent can be attributed to oil and gas activity.
Once you've seen Episode 3, please help us fight for a restored Gulf, whole communities, and a safe Gulf future by donating to our efforts. Signing up as a Gulf Sustainer with an automatic monthly donation is the most efficient and effective way to support a healthy Gulf.
Many economists are waiting to create an economic impact statement for the BP drilling disaster until after the oil stops gushing out into the Gulf of Mexico. An economic impact statement is important for many reasons: (1) it will give a better idea to people of the severity of the disaster; (2) it will help those affected by the disaster to claim a more accurate, and likely much higher, assessment of how they have been adversely affected by the disaster; and (3) an economic impact statement will assist in the Natural Resource Damage Assessment ("NRDA"), which BP will have to pay in order to repair and restore impacted natural resources. Aside from the ecological damage from the disaster, the major industries impacted from the disaster are commercial fishing, recreational fishing, and tourism.
The BP drilling disaster has hampered, if not shut down, the business of commercial fishing along the Gulf coast. In fact, eight of the top 50 ports in the United States, ranked by dollar value, are on or near the federal waters that have been closed due to the BP drilling disaster. Based off of 2008 totals, the total amount of money earned annually from the ports that are currently being affected by the spill is $265.8 million. Most economists use a multiplier between 1.5 and 3.0 to account for the wholesale and retail market chain value stemming from commercial fisheries. Assuming, for arguments sake, that all of the ports are, or will be, completely shut down, this would also halt between $398.7 million and $797.4 million of annual wholesale and retail market activity. In total, the commercial fisheries being shut down could result in more than $1 billion of lost economic value annually just among the states of Louisiana, Mississippi, and Alabama.
While much more money is made in commercial fishing than recreational fishing, creating an economic impact statement for recreational fishing is still very important as there are over 2-million marine anglers on the Gulf coast. Unfortunately, BP's drilling disaster's economic impact on recreational fishing is difficult to total. Coming up with a recreational fishing economic impact statement is hard because most of the data collected is through surveys; collecting and totaling surveys is a very long process. Because recreational fishermen do not record when and how often they go out, surveys are a good way to measure the impact of a disaster. Survey data has yet to be collected post-disaster, but when it does the survey will measure, among other things, the difference in amount of trips taken by recreational fishermen before and after the BP drilling disaster.
One of the biggest unknowns, in creating the economic impact statement, is the affect of the BP drilling disaster on tourism. Measuring why someone chose to cancel dinner, hotel, and flight plans is complicated as there are many variables involved. For example, did someone cancel a hotel reservation in Pensacola because they chose to work an extra week at home or was it because of the oil in the Gulf of Mexico?
A long-term economic statement has yet to be published, and it will likely not be published for some time. When speaking to some economists, they said that the economic impact statements created from previous hurricane seasons will pale in comparison, and dollar value, to the economic impact statement for BP’s drilling disaster.
While many of the folks here at GRN have been actively monitoring the BP drilling disaster and its impacts, I hadn’t personally made the journey until last week. It’s an overwhelming experience, to say the least.
Last Thursday I had the honor of offering testimony to the House Natural Resources Committee's Subcommittee on Insular Affairs, Oceans, and Wildlife. You can watch the whole hearing here. I spoke on a panel with fellow Gulf Coast Fund advisor, Brenda Dardar of the United Houma Nation (read her powerful testimony about the impacts to her community here), scientists, and representatives from the commercial and recreational fishing sectors, we were able to greatly expand the Congressional record to reflect a wide range of the environmental and economic impacts of BP's deepwater drilling disaster. You can read GRN's testimony here.
The real fireworks happened during the previous panel. With represesntatives of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Services, NOAA, and Louisiana's Secretary Robert Barham of the Department of Wildlife and Fisheries, things got heated during the Q & A...
Businesses and individuals across the country are finding creative and constructive ways to respond to the disaster in the Gulf and support GRN. Check out these products and events that are raising funds for GRN's response to BP's oil drilling disaster. Buy great stuff, and their donations to GRN will help us continue our work. Lots more partnerships are in the works, so keep checking the blog for new listings.
Attention: Artists and designers use your skills to DO SOMETHING about the Gulf oil disaster
Attention: Artists and designers use your skills to DO SOMETHING about the Gulf oil disaster
