America's Wetland Foundation

Senator Wicker: Water Resources Bill is Win for Mississippi

By: DredgingToday.com

U.S. Senator Roger Wicker (R-Miss.) on Wednesday praised passage of the “Water Resources Development Act of 2013” (S. 601) by the U.S. Senate. The bill, which passed by a vote of 83-14, supports the development of water-related resources and authorizes the Secretary of the Army to construct projects for improving U.S. rivers and harbors.

2013 World Delta Dialogues Conference program is now available.

By: America's WETLAND Foundation

The official program is now available for the 2013 World Deltas Dialogue, taking place in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam May 19 - May 23.

US Senate passes bill to improve Mississippi River management

By: BND.com

The U.S. Senate on Wednesday approved a measure sponsored by U.S. Sen. Dick Durbin, D-Springfield, to boost efforts to maintain commercial river traffic during droughts and floods.

AWF board member Karen Gautreaux receives The Coalition to Restore Coastal Louisiana's "Distinguished Service Award"

By: America's WETLAND Foundation

Waters vows action to avert 'unaffordable' premium hikes blamed on flood insurance bill

By: Bruce Alpert, Nola.com

WASHINGTON -- The co-author of legislation that Louisiana officials say is leading to significant hikes in federal flood insurance premiums promised Saturday to work with congressional colleagues and the Obama administration officials to resolve the problem.

WWNO To Examine Coastal Land Loss In New Series

By: WWNO Staff, WWNO

Rising sea levels threaten communities on every American coastline, but none more so than Louisiana’s Gulf Coast, where every hour a football field’s worth of marsh disappears.

World Delta Dialogues Conference in Vietnam

By: Deltares

Deltares is coordinator of the Dutch presentations of the DELTAS2013-World Delta Dialogues II Conference in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam from 19 to 23 May 2013. The Dutch presentations will include the results of the ‘Mekong Delta Plan’ and ‘Climate Proofing of Delta Cities’ (a comparative perspective on New Orleans and Ho Chi Minh City). Another relevant topic that will be presented by the Dutch is: ‘Building with Nature & Living with Water: Solutions for the Mekong River and Vietnam Coastal Areas’.

Sediment Diversion to Rebuild Wetlands

By: Kevin Wilcox, ASCE

Preliminary work is under way on two ambitious projects aimed at building as much as 25,000 acres of wetlands within coastal Louisiana by diverting water and sediment from the Mississippi River. The projects seek to form this land by mimicking the natural processes that created such areas in the region before levees were built along the river to control flooding.

Empty Nets on the Mekong

By: Jeff Opperman, New York Times

In my last post, I described how our attempts at fishing in the Mekong River had produced meager results, which was somewhat puzzling because the Mekong produces the largest harvest of freshwater fish in the world, by far.

Cheers and Jeers: May 3, 2013

By: Dailycomet.com, Dailycomet.com

A worldly cause — Rebecca Templeton knows a lot about the unique challenges and difficulties facing the local bayou communities. And she is taking her message halfway around the world to spread it to an international audience.

Local nonprofit leader heads to Vietnam to discuss coast

By: Nikki Buskey, Houmatoday.com

A Terrebonne resident and nonprofit leader will head to Vietnam later this month to discuss the challenges faced by those who live on river deltas worldwide.

Infrastructure upgrades needed now to Mississippi River system

By: KHQA Newsdesk, KHQA

Over the last few weeks we've all been reminded of how important the Mississippi River is to life in the Tri-States.

Science Communication Both an Opportunity and an Obligation

By: Donald Boesch, Scientific American

In the 1980s I was working in the middle of nowhere to build Louisiana’s first marine laboratory. We had two new research vessels in the works, but before they were in the water, my colleagues and I were working farther offshore in the Gulf of Mexico than we should have, in small boats on unpredictable seas. We were beginning to document a disturbing region in the Gulf where the oxygen is depleted from bottom waters during the summer.

Washed away

By: Advocate Staff Writer, The Baton Rouge Advocate

Yellow Cotton Bay, officially, no longer exists. The bay, along with Bayou Jacquin and 29 other places in Plaquemines Parish, have been lost from Louisiana’s shrinking coast.

28,000 Rivers Disappeared in China: What Happened?

By: ANGEL HSU AND WILLIAM MIAO, The Atlantic

As recently as 20 years ago, there were an estimated 50,000 rivers in China, each covering a flow area of at least 60 square miles. But now, according to China's First National Census of Water, more than 28,000 of these rivers are missing. To put this number into context, China's lost rivers are almost equivalent, in terms of basin area, to the United States losing the entire Mississippi River.