Download: Estuary News, October 2013 PDF
With so much of San Francisco Bay so shallow, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers has long had to dredge out channels and harbors so ships don’t run aground, an activity not without its ill effects on the ecosystem. In the 1980s, fishers complained about turbidity driving away their catch – both from the dredging activity itself and from the dumping of the material back into the Bay at more than a dozen aquatic disposal sites. At the same time, water quality watchdogs worried that all the scooping and dumping not only stirred up long-buried contaminants but also re-suspended and redistributed them. To make matters worse, the depth finder of an inbound ship, out in the main Central Bay shipping channel, suddenly flashed “0” one day. A 72-foot mound of dredged material had accumulated just 30 feet below the surface at the Alcatraz disposal site.
By the time dredgers, fishers, regulators, and ports sat down at the CCMP negotiating table, the region was in the midst of a “mudlock.” To help break it, regional interests and the San Francisco Estuary Partnership underwrote the first serious research on how turbidity affected fish, and whether dredging activities disturbed bottom dwelling organisms. They also began studying how quickly sediment dispersed from disposal sites, and where it ended up. At the time, no one could have imagined that the region would be even more obsessed with what any layperson would call “mud” 20 years later.
“Dredged material has gone from something called a ‘spoil’ to something viewed as a resource,” says Al Paniccia of the US Army Corps of Engineers. “It’s now considered so valuable, nobody wants it to be hauled off to a deep ocean site for disposal anymore. There’s been a 180-degree change in attitude.”
Paniccia is one of four managers from key agencies who now work together to manage Bay dredging. But they weren’t working together yet in 1993, during the mudlock. Back then, 80 percent of the dredged material was put back in the Bay at various sites, only the most contaminated materials were placed on upland sites, and there was no EPA- approved ocean disposal site as there is today.
Enter the CCMP process. Participants set straightforward goals: eliminate unnecessary dredging and manage waterway modification to offset adverse impacts. To accomplish these goals, the Corps, BCDC, the Regional Water Quality Control Board, and port representatives worked with the fish and wildlife agencies that had to be consulted about impacts to endangered species on a long term management strategy for the placement of dredged material in the region (“LTMS”). The strategy called for reducing disposal in the Bay to 20 percent by 2013, and for maximizing the beneficial reuse of dredged material – another CCMP goal.
“The CCMP called for a new management strategy, and for putting in place a strong sediment testing program, so we created a cooperative program to manage it all, the LTMS and the DMMO,” says BCDC’s Deputy Chief Steve Goldbeck, referring to the one-stop interagency Dredged Material Management Office. The office was set up with input not only from the agencies issuing dredging permits, but also from the ports and marinas trying to get them, represented through the Bay Planning Coalition. “We really worked hard to deliver on all the promises we had made,” says Goldbeck.
Another accomplishment was agreement on “environmental work windows” over the course of the year. In these week-by-week windows, dredging activities could proceed with fewer hoops to jump through than at other times when fish and wildlife might be more sensitive, such as when birds are breeding or salmon migrating.
Between the LTMS, the DMMO, and the windows, dredgers got a lot more clarity on how they could proceed, and wasted less time idling expensive equipment. Further clarity came from strong research and analytical work on the part of US EPA, the Water Board and regional water quality monitoring programs (see insert) to develop clear sediment testing guidelines, and sediment quality objectives for beneficial reuse. Knowing which materials were too contaminated to put back in the Bay really settled fears about making contamination worse.
“Our dredging program runs so much more smoothly these days because of interagency partnerships we’ve developed over the years through LTMS,” says Paniccia. “Our permitting process and sediment testing are pretty streamlined and straightforward now – we all know what we’re doing. We don’t always get to dredge in the window, but even dredging outside the window isn’t a crisis anymore.”
The results have been encouraging. A newly published 12-year LTMS review found that all targets for reducing in-Bay disposal volumes were met – decreasing from 80 to 20 percent. More than 44 percent of the material dredged from the Bay was beneficially reused in restoration projects, ranging from building beaches and raising wetland elevations to providing the muddy foundations of new eelgrass beds. In addition, more than 80 percent of dredging and disposal activities are now completed within the windows protective of wildlife.
Looking ahead, many challenges remain – despite the significant accomplishments in this CCMP program area. One federal policy, for example, could do with an update more in tune with regional priorities. The policy requires the Corps to always chose the “least cost environmentally acceptable” alternative for dredged material disposal. Unfortunately the more you handle the material, the more it costs. So moving it from the Bay bottom to a transport scow to an off loader, and then finally pumping it miles across mudflats onto a wetland is costly, especially with diesel fuel now so much more expensive.
“It’s a double whammy,” says Goldbeck. “The Corps no longer has enough money nationally to dredge even critical channels, and lots of small harbors that support small fishing fleets don’t get dredged at all.”
With the fierce competition for each smaller sequestered dollar, as well as least-cost policy obstacles and skyrocketing fuel costs, the Corps struggles to help the region make the most of its mud. In the coming year, however, the Corps will be able to beneficially reuse some sediment from its annual Oakland Harbor dredging project through an innovative placement strategy. “By allowing some material to go in-bay, we’ve been able to offset the cost of taking some material upland, so in that way we can comply with federal standards but still be flexible enough to help with restoration,” says Paniccia.
What LTMS agencies remain most concerned about today is the loss of federal funding to sustain the extraordinary science and monitoring programs that have helped all stakeholders feel comfortable with the impacts of dredging in the Bay. As vast new wetland restoration sites clamor for more mud to fill up subsided salt ponds and diked baylands so they can keep pace with sea level rise, most stakeholders are starting to feel no material at all should be “wasted” by being dumped at the ocean disposal site. But at what cost, and to whom? Working out such thorny multi-objective issues sounds like grist for future CCMPs.
Projects Implementing Dredging Actions: Lots
By Ariel Rubissow Okamoto
Nothing could be stranger than sitting in the dark with thousands of suits and heels, watching a parade of promises to decarbonize from companies and countries large and small, reeling from the beauties of big screen rainforests and indigenous necklaces, and getting all choked up.
It was day two of the September 2018 Global Climate Action Summit in San Francisco when I felt it.
At first I wondered if I was simply starstruck. Most of us labor away trying to fix one small corner of the planet or another without seeing the likes of Harrison Ford, Al Gore, Michael Bloomberg, Van Jones, Jerry Brown – or the ministers or mayors of dozens of cities and countries – in person, on stage and at times angry enough to spit. And between these luminaries a steady stream of CEOs, corporate sustainability officers, and pension fund managers promising percentages of renewables and profits in their portfolios dedicated to the climate cause by 2020-2050.
I tried to give every speaker my full attention: the young man of Vuntut Gwichin heritage from the edge of the Yukon’s Arctic National Wildlife Refuge who pleaded with us not to enter his sacred lands with our drills and dependencies; all the women – swathed in bright patterns and head-scarfs – who kept punching their hearts. “My uncle in Uganda would take 129 years to emit the same amount of carbon as an American would in one year,” said Oxfam’s Winnie Byanyima.
“Our janitors are shutting off the lights you leave on,” said Aida Cardenas, speaking about the frontline workers she trains, mostly immigrants, who are excited to be part of climate change solutions in their new country.
The men on the stage, strutting about in feathers and pinstripes, spoke of hopes and dreams, money and power. “The notion that you can either do good or do well is a myth we have to collectively bust,” said New Jersey Governor Phil Murphy whose state is investing heavily in offshore wind farms.
“Climate change isn’t just about risks, it’s about opportunities,” said Blackrock sustainable investment manager Brian Deese.
But it wasn’t all these fine speeches that started the butterflies. Halfway through the second day of testimonials, it was a slight white-haired woman wrapped in an azure pashmina that pricked my tears. One minute she was on the silver screen with Alec Baldwin and the next she taking a seat on stage. She talked about trees. How trees can solve 30% of our carbon reduction problem. How we have to stop whacking them back in the Amazon and start planting them everywhere else. I couldn’t help thinking of Dr. Seuss and his truffala trees. Jane Goodall, over 80, is as fierce as my Lorax. Or my daughter’s Avatar.
Analyzing my take home feeling from the event I realized it wasn’t the usual fear – killer storms, tidal waves, no food for my kids to eat on a half-baked planet – nor a newfound sense of hope – I’ve always thought nature will get along just fine without us. What I felt was relief. People were actually doing something. Doing a lot. And there was so much more we could do.
As we all pumped fists in the dark, as the presentations went on and on and on because so many people and businesses and countries wanted to STEP UP, I realized how swayed I had let myself be by the doomsday news mill.
“We must be like the river, “ said a boy from Bangladesh named Risalat Khan, who had noticed our Sierra watersheds from the plane. “We must cut through the mountain of obstacles. Let’s be the river!”
Or as Harrison Ford less poetically put it: “Let’s turn off our phones and roll up our sleeves and kick this monster’s ass.”
by Isaac Pearlman
Since California’s last state-led climate change assessment in 2012, the Golden State has experienced a litany of natural disasters. This includes four years of severe drought from 2012 to 2016, an almost non-existent Sierra Nevada snowpack in 2014-2015 costing $2.1 billion in economic losses, widespread Bay Area flooding from winter 2017 storms, and extremely large and damaging wildfires culminating with this year’s Mendocino Complex fire achieving the dubious distinction of the largest in state history. California’s most recent climate assessment, released August 27th, predicts that for the state and the Bay Area, we can expect even more in the future.
The California state government first began assessing climate impacts formally in 2006, due to an executive order by Governor Schwarzenegger. California’s latest iteration and its fourth overall, includes a dizzying array of 44 technical reports; three topical studies on climate justice, tribal and indigenous communities, and the coast and ocean; as well as nine region-specific analyses.
The results are alarming for our state’s future: an estimated four to five feet of sea level rise and loss of one to two-thirds of Southern California beaches by 2100, a 50 percent increase in wildfires over 25,000 acres, stronger and longer heat waves, and infrastructure like airports, wastewater treatment plants, rail and roadways increasingly likely to suffer flooding.
For the first time, California’s latest assessment dives into climate consequences on a regional level. Academics representing nine California regions spearheaded research and summarized the best available science on the variable heat, rain, flooding and extreme event consequences for their areas. For example, the highest local rate of sea level rise in the state is at the rapidly subsiding Humboldt Bay. In San Diego county, the most biodiverse in all of California, preserving its many fragile and endangered species is an urgent priority. Francesca Hopkins from UC Riverside found that the highest rate of childhood asthma in the state isn’t an urban smog-filled city but in the Imperial Valley, where toxic dust from Salton Sea disaster chokes communities – and will only become worse as higher temperatures and less water due to climate change dry and brittle the area.
According to the Bay Area Regional Report, since 1950 the Bay Area has already increased in temperature by 1.7 degrees Fahrenheit and local sea level is eight inches higher than it was one hundred years ago. Future climate will render the Bay Area less suitable for our evergreen redwood and fir forests, and more favorable for tolerant chaparral shrub land. The region’s seven million people and $750 billion economy (almost one-third of California’s total) is predicted to be increasingly beset by more “boom and bust” irregular wet and very dry years, punctuated by increasingly intense and damaging storms.
Unsurprisingly, according to the report the Bay Area’s intensifying housing and equity problems have a multiplier affect with climate change. As Bay Area housing spreads further north, south, and inland the result is higher transportation and energy needs for those with the fewest resources available to afford them; and acute disparity in climate vulnerability across Bay Area communities and populations.
“All Californians will likely endure more illness and be at greater risk of early death because of climate change,” bluntly states the statewide summary brochure for California’s climate assessment. “[However] vulnerable populations that already experience the greatest adverse health impacts will be disproportionately affected.”
“We’re much better at being reactive to a disaster than planning ahead,” said UC Berkeley professor and contributing author David Ackerly at a California Adaptation Forum panel in Sacramento on August 27th. “And it is vulnerable communities that suffer from those disasters. How much human suffering has to happen before it triggers the next round of activity?”
The assessment’s data is publicly available online at “Cal-adapt,” where Californians can explore projected impacts for their neighborhoods, towns, and regions.