Engineering

A general permit for marsh sills, a type of “living shoreline,” is now available to people in coastal North Carolina who want to stabilize estuarine shorelines.

The Town of Oak Bluffs is seeking a permit from the Army Corps’ New England District to conduct work in waters of the U.S. in conjunction with protecting coastal banks and restoring public beaches in Oak Bluffs, Martha’s Vineyard, Massachusetts.

The City of Rockingham will carry out sand renourishment works at Challenger Beach this month to combat ongoing erosion issues that are occurring on site.

Thirty years of research and community debate about the most effective way of controlling severe erosion at Jimmys Beach, Hawks Nest will culminate next month when the first load of sand from a newly installed sand transfer system is pumped onto the beach.

Homeowners on Cape Cod have long looked for innovative technology to protect their homes from erosion, but it looks likely that rows of timber pilings will not fit the bill, at least not ones that are packed tightly together.

Rising sea levels can submerge the backbone of the internet, increasingly powerful storms can destroy the cell networks phones need to work, and high-intensity winds can tear down the critical infrastructure that makes 21st century America go.

BEAUMONT — Jefferson County Judge Jeff Branick updated commissioners’ court Monday on the ongoing coastal reconstruction project. (CNT Note: For you non-Texans, the "County Judge" is the elected Chief Executive of the county, not a judicial position. The "Commissioners Court" is the county's board of county commissioners).

Sea level rise and ground subsidence will render the flood barriers inadequate in just four years

The Port of Ngqura is the first port in the world to have a fixed embedded jet pump sand bypass. The sand bypass is designed to mimic the natural long shore drift of sand along the coast of South Africa. This is achieved by pumping the sand from the updrift (west) section of the coast to the downdrift (east) section of the coast.

The project will include the expansion of the Lower Manhattan shoreline and four capital projects devoted to the resiliency of Lower Manhattan neighborhoods

Hunting Island’s North Beach would receive an additional 1.2 million cubic yards of sand pumped from the ocean floor. Under the settlement reached with the Coastal Conservation League last year, the number of proposed groins — hard structures extending into the water to trap and build up sand on the beach — would be reduced from four to one with an option to build a second.

Plans to provide new flood defenses for the Southsea Seafront continue to progress with a tender for detailed engineering designs now underway, Southsea Coastal Scheme said in its latest release.

A slate of $132 million in projects intended to offset environmental impacts of the Deepwater Horizon disaster on the Alabama coast has received federal approval, Gov. Kay Ivey’s office announced Friday.

With crumbling sea walls, rising seas and effective federal action still up in the air, it’s no wonder that climate change is a growing topic of concern for San Franciscans.

New South Wales, Australia - Construction work on the $4.1 million sand transfer system at Jimmys Beach, Hawks Next has been completed.

INDIANA - Time is not on the side of the Portage Lakefront and Riverwalk. With the Indiana legislature preparing to finalize the state’s biennial budget this month, advocates working to save the riverwalk from further erosion and the resulting damage said receiving $1 million in state funds now toward beach nourishment and a study on long-term solutions is critical.

Fortified wetlands can protect shorelines better than hard structures. Surprising data show that in many places marshes protect shorelines better than walls and are cheaper to construct. Scientists are perfecting techniques for rebuilding tattered wetlands, creating custom configurations for individual shorelines. Governments and disaster planners are starting to give more consideration to living shorelines, and money to restore them is rising.

Climate change is already leading to unprecedented flooding, but urban planners have many tools to help them keep things dry

FLORIDA - Construction on the controversial $516,000 Flagler County Coastal Wetlands Restoration Project began on Feb. 13 on 100 acres of decades-old dragline ditches in the area of the Intracoastal Waterway, parallel to Gamble Rogers State Recreation Area and parts of Flagler Beach.

“They start at 6 a.m., if you can believe it,” my friend told me with a hint of frustration. This was his neighborhood, and we were both gawking at a huge pile-driver sitting atop the dune across from the Turtle Shack in Flagler Beach."

FLORIDA - Sarasota finished work that began last November and added 40 to 80 feet of sand to critically eroded areas.

RYE, New Hampshire-- The Board of Selectmen met with a state Department of Environmental Services (DES) representative to review conservation practices to reduce erosion and prepare for impacts of sea level rise on the town’s coast and coastal estuaries.

Scientists use satellite data to map the Houston-Galveston area impacted by Hurricane Harvey

The General Land Office, the lead coastal agency in Texas, is making available $1.8 M in new grant funds for coastal projects. The GLO administers the state Beach Access & Dune Protection Program, Texas Coastal Management Program, the Coastal Erosion Response and Planning Act (CEPRA), the Texas Oil Spill Response Program, Gulf of Mexico Energy Security Act (GOMESA) funds, and Post-Hurricane Harvey Community Development Block Grants, and plays an major role in the allocation of RESTORE Act revenues derived from the BP Horizon Oil Spill,

SARASOTA COUNTY — Residents on Manasota Key who fear their homes could be washed away by the Gulf of Mexico will finally get the protection they desperately need for their properties.

Great Lakes Dredge & Dock Company (GLDD) finished working eastward from the submerged pipeline landing at 8th Street on Saturday (April 6), and is now working westward from 8th Street, informs the Carteret County Shore Protection Office.

Twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week, a mix of tools and machinery is hard at work in a part of South Carolina known as a place for fun and relaxation: the coastline in and around Myrtle Beach.

Investors sentiment increased to 1.61 in Q4 2018. It's up 0.30, from 1.31 in 2018Q3. It is positive, as 4 investors sold Great Lakes Dredge & Dock Corporation shares while 32 reduced holdings. 32 funds opened positions while 26 raised stakes. 43.74 million shares or 0.86% more from 43.37 million shares in 2018Q3 were reported.

As sea waters slowly rose around his temple and his neighbours fled inland, Thai abbot Somnuek Atipanyo refused to budge and is today a symbol of the fight to restore the country's fast-eroding coastlines.

New Jersey - Video of Weeks Marine's trailing hopper suction dredges "RN Weeks" and "MV Magdalen" work offshore to pumping sand ashore while support excavating machinery builds back the Lavallette Beach, in NJ.

Last done in 2016, part of a 50-year federal program, state pays 35 percent

VIRGINIA BEACH, Va. – Renourishment to Sandbridge Beach and dunes are soon to come after an agreement was authorized to use of up to 2.2 million cubic yards of sand from federal waters.

Changing Climate Report says East Coast sea levels could rise 75 cm to 1 metre in next century

Like all cities, Jacksonville faces an expanding list of challenges.

As we march toward a new climate reality, are we leaving the public behind? The New York City Panel on Climate Change’s (NPCC) 2019 report, released on March 15, offers a sobering new lens known as the Rapid Ice Melt scenario: the metropolitan region could experience 9.5 feet of sea level rise by the end of the century. That’s six inches short of the height of a regulation basketball hoop.

A U.S. Army Corps of Engineers contractor has begun moving work vessels, pipe, and other equipment to perform maintenance dredging of East Rockaway Inlet to beneficially use dredged sand to re-nourish and restore Rockaway Beach between Beach 92nd Street and Beach 103rd Street, the USACE and Mayor Bill de Blasio announced on Monday.

In yet another effort to dedicate more state funding to new highways and bridges, Rep. Tanner Magee, R-Houma, is proposing a bill that would dedicate $50 million a year in BP settlement funds to a few specific infrastructure projects. Among these projects is a new flyover ramp connecting La. 415 in West Baton Rouge Parish across the Intracoastal Waterway to La. 1.

After hurricanes during the past three years knocked out electricity for millions of Floridians, lawmakers are moving forward with regulatory changes that could lead to more underground power lines.

Natural disasters can cause erosion and destruction, that's why Collier County is taking steps to prevent catastrophic damages to structures near the coast.

Between 1944 and 2017, the state of Florida spent at least $1.34 billion on beach rebuilding projects. Put another way, we could have renourished our beaches with dollar bills instead of sand — and the effect would be pretty much the same.

Lake Okeechobee discharges have stopped to the St. Lucie River and been reduced to the Caloosahatchee River, but the Army Corps of Engineers hasn't ruled out the possibility of restarting and increasing them.

The fortunes of the Resource Institute could continue to dwindle, as the towns of Topsail Beach and Surf City are asking their lawmaker for tax dollars originally appropriated to the controversial nonprofit.

Flooding, the costliest and most common disaster in the United States, leaves no part of the country untouched: from nor’easters along the coast of Maine, to king tides in Florida, to overflowing rivers in Nebraska, to mudslides in California.

The event could occur at any time through a combination of stormy weather conditions, say emergency officials

Beach engineer Chris Gibson expected some of the newly arrived sand to be pushed back out to sea during the spring northeaster season, but said it’s all a part of the symbiotic relationship between beach nourishment work and “Mother Nature."

STATEN ISLAND -- As the federal government readies to begin construction on the long-awaited East Shore Seawall, some frequent Island visitors of the South Beach Boardwalk worry about losing a beloved recreation and scenic area for years.

The $10B climate resiliency plan would extend the Manhattan shoreline by as much as 500 feet into the East River.

Highway 101 is busy. People driving between Solana Beach and Encinitas can take the scenic road instead of hopping onto the nearby, but frequently congested Interstate 5. Encinitas City Council Member Kelly Shaw Hinze said the road draws more than just car traffic.

Louisiana - State Sen. Eddie Lambert, R-Prairieville, is calling for the advancement of a roughly $877 million sediment diversion effort—as well as more diversion projects in general—between Baton Rouge and New Orleans.

The total cost of the partnership with Charlotte County is estimated at $35.3 million, with a projected $7.7 coming from Sarasota

Barrier built after last week's nor'easter conditions washed away part of road By Allyson Henning - Reporter, Jennifer Ready - Reporter

Residents and businesses may see changes to their flood insurance rates as Hillsborough County coastal flood maps are updated for the first time in 30 years.

BOGUE BANKS — The $20.1 million beach nourishment stalled a bit late last week because of bad weather and sea conditions, but it’s still on track for completion well ahead of schedule.

A feasibility study to ongoing erosion at Magnolia Beach in Texas was approved by the Calhoun County Commissioners’ Court during its meeting last week.

The wall would stretch along more than 2,000 metres of coastline

Mike Page, 79, created a unique aerial archive showing the alarming erosion of land in Norfolk and Suffolk. Images show how shoreline has shrunk between 1999 and the present day as large chunks fall into the sea . Mr Page flies above the coastline in a two seater Cessna 150 and takes photos with a handheld Cannon 1D3

Work under the Post Florence Renourishment project continues to progress eastward towards the Summer Winds (Indian Beach), informs the Carteret County Shore Protection Office.

Contractors will begin deploying equipment any day now and re-nourishment of the beach in Nags Head is expected to start by the end of April.

Balluta Bay, Malta - Marine experts had warned project was doomed to fail. The little sand that remained at Balluta Bay, St Julian’s, has disappeared after the latest storm, just seven months after the completion of €110,000-replenishment project by the Tourism Ministry.

Bill de Blasio has plans to part the East River—and expects New Yorkers to follow him 500 feet into the estuary, to a new land that will protect downtown from the sea.

People have been giving their views on how West Kirby's new flood defence wall will look

WASHINGTON, D.C. - A budget proposal that President Donald Trump unveiled last week calls for ending a ban on dumping material dredged from Cleveland harbor and the Cuyahoga River into Lake Erie without approval from the state of Ohio.

There’s something uniquely Houston about the fact that one of the most flamboyant celebrations the city ever held was in commemoration of a bayou infrastructure project.

Data from the Singapore Land Authority showed that Singapore had grown to 724.2 square kilometres in 2018 as compared to its land size of 581.5 square kilometres in 1959 — a 24 per cent increase.

NORFOLK, VA - Can Virginia make money off sea level rise? The very idea sounds backwards — usually frequent flooding from bigger and more destructive storms is costly. Remember Hurricane Florence? One study showed a direct hit could have cost the region $5 billion of its gross domestic product in just three months.

WILMINGTON, N.C. – When the long-standing state ban was lifted on terminal groins, a handful of beach towns jumped at the chance to build a case for why a hardened erosion-control structure would be their best line of defense against losing sand.

The most expensive coastal restoration project ever attempted in Louisiana will be delayed several months due to a series of permitting, design and engineering setbacks.

As entire islands disappear in Chesapeake Bay, the oyster is enlisted as a first line of climate defense. In Sudden Spring: Stories of Adaptation in a Climate-Changed South, Rick Van Noy shows what communities are doing to become more climate-resilient and to survive environmental challenges. Here, he tours Chesapeake Bay off the coast of Virginia Beach, where entire islands are disappearing because of rising sea levels. He finds that, in the shadow of the nearby naval base, the best defense against the effects of climate change may come from an unexpected source: the humble oyster.

Every journey of a thousand miles, the adage goes, begins with a single step. Last week, a state Senate committee took a small step toward protecting our region against the devastation that can be foreseen as the sea keeps rising.

As Rowan Jacobsen reports in FERN’s latest story, published with Scientific American, research done over the last decade has made clear that “living shorelines” are far better at protecting the coastline from the devastating floods and tidal surges caused by the huge storms of the climate-change era than seawalls and other “armored” shorelines.

The Carteret County announced yesterday that Reach 3 (east Indian Beach and Salter Path) under the Post Florence Renourishment Project was completed last Sunday.

The Massachusetts Port Authority announced that $35 million has been secured to help fund the ongoing Boston Harbor Dredging Project. The project is approximately 30 percent complete, and this funding will enable the project to continue on schedule.

Have you ever wondered what happens to New York City’s subway cars after they are taken out of service? From 2001 to 2010, the Metropolitan Transit Authority (MTA), dropped 2,580 cars into the Atlantic Ocean, off the coasts of New Jersey, Delaware, Maryland, Virginia, South Carolina, and Georgia, to become artificial reefs. This incredible process, which began in the 207th Street Overhaul Shop in Inwood, Manhattan, was documented over the course of two years by photographer Stephen Mallon.

Plummeting to the bottom of an icy sea bed, divers have completed the final part of a wharf deconstruction on the British Antarctic Survey (BAS) at Rothera Research Station. Two months of deconstructing the old wharf came to an end over the weekend with the first frame of a new 74-metre long wharf being lowered into place.

In 2006, a year after hurricanes Katrina and Rita devastated New Orleans and the Gulf Coast, the U.S. government struck a deal to give states in the region a growing share of offshore drilling revenues to finance projects protecting them from future monster storms.

A Record of Decision has been received from the Federal Highway Administration for the Mid-Currituck Bridge, indicating federal approval of a span between Aydlett on the mainland and Corolla on the Outer Banks.

State lawmakers may ease restrictions on the construction of decks and patios next to sand dunes, plus crosswalks over dunes, even as the lead author of NOAA’s Atlantic Ocean hurricane outlooks issued this month a preliminary warning that the upcoming hurricane season will be as dynamic as the one that pummeled Georgia in 2018.

The tiny coastal community of Stolford has become the first location in the UK to benefit from innovative flood defence technology pioneered in Holland.

The Mississippi River has been at flood stage for months. Levees and spillways keep most homes and businesses safe and dry from the flood waters, but the high water still creates headaches for levee districts and industries like oil and gas, and fisheries.

A Belgian company, Global Sea Mineral Resources, is set to test a bus-size machine designed to vacuum up metallic nodules that sit on the dark abyssal sea floor in the Clarion-Clipperton Zone, a nodule-rich area between Mexico and Hawaii. During the short trial, a team of independent scientists will deploy more than 60 sensors to monitor the collector's environmental impact.

New York Mayor Bill de Blasio proposed a $10 billion plan to push out the lower Manhattan coastline as much as 500 feet, or two city blocks, to protect from flooding that’s expected to become more frequent as global temperatures rise.

Mississippi will spend more than $23 million in Gulf of Mexico Energy Security Act money on six projects, Gov. Phil Bryant announced on Wednesday.

The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers has engaged Eastman Aggregate Enterprises to renourish 7.2 miles of critically eroded shoreline along the City of Hollywood, Florida.

More than a decade ago, the World Bank’s offered the first green bond and a blueprint for what is currently a $500+ billion market (watch a video on the history here).

“People want things back to normal sooner rather than later.”

Tian Kun Hao, a Chinese-built dredging vessel, the largest of its kind in Asia, sails under a sea trial after departing a port in east China's Jiangsu Province, Constructed by Tianjin Dredging Co. Ltd., a subsidiary of China Communication Construction Co., Ltd. (CCCC), the 140-meter-long vessel, with the designed capacity to dredge 6,000 cubic meters per hour, can dig as deep as 35 meters under the sea floor.

KAHANA BAY, MAUI (HawaiiNewsNow) - A new beach nourishment proposal could help restore a shrinking shoreline along the coast of West Maui — and end a fierce fight over a seawall that’s currently under construction.

The initial plan is to spend $500 million to fortify most of lower Manhattan with grassy berms in parks and removable barriers than can be installed this year when major storms approach. But the mayor and recommendations the city's Lower Manhattan Coastal Resiliency project calls for a more ambitious long-term plan.

The General Land Office’s updated Texas Coastal Resiliency Master Plan, released Monday, is a beauty, with lots of spot color, graphics and maps. It’s worth a look. Spilling out over 234 pages, it includes 123 projects that GLO believes are preferred, in that they can do the most good to “restore, enhance and protect the coast.” Can’t argue with that. Call them Tier 1 projects, which is what GLO does.

Two juries in Ocean County recently awarded oceanfront homeowners with compensation for easements placed on their properties in connection with beach replenishment. Some have questioned if these awards will negatively affect the continuation of beach replenishment projects.

In the most extensive study to date on sea level rise in California, researchers say damage by the end of the century could be far more devastating than the worst earthquakes and wildfires in state history.

MMIS maps offshore sand information for managing physical sediment resources in the OCS

The state General Land Office has updated its master plan for coastal resiliency, which includes 17 projects in Jefferson and Orange counties, part of the effort to protect and promote “a vibrant and resilient Texas Coast.”

President Trump today proposed cutting the budget of the military arm tasked with flood control and emergency response by nearly a third.

SHALIMAR — By the end of this week, Okaloosa County officials hope to find a dredge that can perform the county’s East Pass dredging/beach restoration work, possibly within the “100 days of summer” from Memorial Day to Labor Day.

Rock structures were contructed pre-1944 to stem sand loss and shoreline recession

NEW YORK – The Army Corps of Engineers later today holds the first of eight public sessions to hear about proposals to build storm surge barriers in New York Harbor.

The Town of Nags Head, NC, will be conducting a beach nourishment maintenance project starting in May 2019 and lasting possibly into October 2019.