By Tensie Whelan As some hurricane victims return home while others still languish in trailer parks and temporary hotels, the debate over rebuilding hurricane-ravaged Gulf Coast communities has been joined, though without much of a blueprint. There has been no near-total reconstruction of a major US city like New Orleans since the 1906 San Francisco earthquake, or the great Chicago fire of 1871, and times have changed radically since then. We now confront twin imperatives to do the unprecedented: to tackle the largest urban reconstruction project in American history quickly, and to do it sustainably.
As some hurricane victims return home while others still languish in trailer parks and temporary hotels, the debate over rebuilding hurricane-ravaged Gulf Coast communities has been joined, though without much of a blueprint. There has been no near-total reconstruction of a major US city like New Orleans since the 1906 San Francisco earthquake, or the great Chicago fire of 1871, and times have changed radically since then. We now confront twin imperatives to do the unprecedented: to tackle the largest urban reconstruction project in American history quickly, and to do it sustainably.
Federal hurricane relief legislation sowed reconstruction with controversy over provisions fast-tracking hundreds of billions in federal aid. For example the Hurricane Katrina Disaster Relief and Economic Recovery Act proposed an independent nine-member commission with a majority of Louisiana officials which would replace the normal Congressional appropriations and approvals process in overseeing federal spending. Equally ominous-sounding are exceptional powers that would allow the commission to waive existing federal environmental laws to expedite projects it approves.
If such provisions get implemented, moving reconstruction forward quickly and accountably without negative environmental impacts will be a particular challenge. Exemption from environmental law and normal congressional oversight are no excuse for ignoring environmental needs and sustainability, especially when there are excellent voluntary regimes for green planning, building and materials that the commission and other decision makers can and should adopt.
For example, the United States Green Building Council (USGBC) is already working with officials on green performance standards for Gulf reconstruction, and with Habitat for Humanity to build green housing for hurricane victims. USGBC’s LEED program (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design) Green Building Rating System is now being tested in major housing markets across the US, including in several Gulf Coast states. It incorporates best sustainable practices into residential and commercial buildings, ranging from site selection, permeability and water runoff from the home site, to recycling construction waste, energy use and indoor air quality. It only makes sense to build such standards into Gulf coast reconstruction now.
Consider, just to focus on one of the many complex issues involved, how the lumber for this massive rebuild will be supplied. The framing wood of choice in the US is pine, grown in our southeastern forests as well as in the Pacific Northwest and in Canada’s northern boreal forests. For Gulf Coast reconstruction, much of it will come from forests from east Texas to North Carolina. But these forests, like forests everywhere, were already heavily stressed from the recent housing boom and other factors, and whether and how to harvest them now is a complex and far-reaching consideration. Meanwhile, the hurricanes left behind thousands of acres of blown down trees in coastal forests, necessitating large-scale salvage logging. Yet salvage operations pose their own environmental challenges and should be handled carefully if we don’t want to add more negative impacts to the toll of this hurricane season.
Who’s got the time or the inclination to attend to such details amid the pressure to get on with massive reconstruction? The Forest Stewardship Council (FSC) does, and already offers the means to supply reconstruction lumber responsibly. The FSC is a well-established voluntary certification regime embraced alike by the LEED program, environmental groups and major forestry companies all around the world. It requires the best, most environmentally and socially responsible practices for growing, managing, harvesting and milling lumber. It also confers certain efficiencies and competitive advantages to producers, so FSC wood ends up cost-competitive with non-certified wood. There is already a $5 billion global market for it, with some 125 million acres of FSC-certified forests in 60 countries worldwide, over 40 million of them in the US covering an area the size of Washington State. Major forestry companies in Mississippi, Louisiana and Arkansas are FSC-certified, and FSC framing lumber is on the shelves right now at Home Depot and other retailers.
If the argument of the policymakers is that Gulf reconstruction is too big and too time-sensitive to be constrained by normal environmental regulation or congressional oversight, this is all the more reason to encourage voluntary standards for making it more sustainable. FSC, LEED and USGBC are all examples of voluntary approaches that aren’t utopian, but practical and ready to go right now. All we have to do is embrace them.
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Tensie Whelan is the executive director of the Rainforest Alliance (www.rainforest-alliance.org), whose SmartWood program is accredited by the Forest Stewardship Council.
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