Speeding the Pace: Decisionmaking for Diversion Project Implementation in Louisiana
Proposed Mississippi River diversions—designed to increase wetland acreage on the Louisiana coast—must secure federal, state, and local government approvals and withstand possible legal challenges.
Key findings
- Diversions will have potentially broad ecological and social effects across a large geographic area.
- The report describes regulatory and budgetary review processes for diversion projects, issues that slow approval, and ways to accelerate decisions.
- The approval process will have to resolve conflicts between proponents and opponents of such projects.
- Approval will hinge on model prediction uncertainty and the role of adaptive management, baseline conditions for assessing ecological and socioeconomic effects, and the potential to mitigate adverse consequences.
