Prudent response

According to a very frightening National Climate Assessment report issued this week... very bad things.

New data from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration is not going to make it any easier for Estopinal to get to sleep.

The federal agency charged with keeping track of sea levels, NOAA says Grand Isle has lost 1.32 inches of elevation to the Gulf of Mexico in the past five years alone — a rate of subsidence about four times faster than any other coastline in the lower 48 states, and one of the highest on the planet.

The rate is so high because the entire southeast portion of the state is sinking while seas are rising worldwide due to global warming. When subsidence is combined with sea level rise, the result is called relative sea level rise.

The latest update only confirms Grand Isle’s nation-leading average of 9.24 millimeters (.363 inches) per year over the past 65 years, or about three feet per century, said Steve Gill,  a chief scientist at NOAA. By contrast, Key West, less subject to subsidence, has been succumbing to rising seas at a rate of just 2.24 millimeters per year, according to federal charts of high tides kept over many decades at selected coastal stations.

Yikes!  Hey, are we doing anything about that?  What are the people who might try and do something about that up to?

The Louisiana Senate voted 24-15 on Wednesday in favor of legislation that would strip the east bank levee authority of its right to file suit to enforce federal or state laws governing coastal wetlands, a move likely to block the authority's July 2013 wetlands damages lawsuit against 97 oil, gas and pipeline companies.

Senate Bill 469, sponsored by Sen. Bret Allain and supported by Gov. Bobby Jindal, prohibits any state or local government agency other than the Department of Natural Resources, attorney general or Coastal Protection and Restoration Authority, from taking actions to enforce federal or state permits in coastal areas.

The legislation was tailored to kill the Southeast Louisiana Flood Protection Authority-East's suit, which Jindal contends violates state law because the authority should have received his permission first, and because it conflicts with the state's coastal restoration and protection Master Plan.

So at least we're protected from that.  Oh and also wine ice cream. They saved us from that too.