by Gigi Leet
- Before Katrina, New Orleans paid relatively little attention to sustainability
- New Orleans locations has a high natural disaster risk
- Katrina predictable and predicted, but predictions ignored (seemed costly, and predictions insufficiently specific or certain at the time)
o Costly: City decimated, $100 Billion pledged from Gov., environment, social, and cultural damages, loss of life.
o After the storm events happened, now everybody is interested in the environment," said Wynecta Fisher, director of the city's Office of Environmental Affairs. "I hate to say that it came at a good time, but because of the storm, we've been able to build on that momentum."
o Prevention cheaper than repair – clear in hindsight
- What to do about it?
o 1st choice – Abandon, move, or rebuild?
o 2ed choice – How to rebuild?
o 3ed choice - Manufactured vs. natural capital?
- Recent Sustainability projects (NGOs, Gov projects, businesses, ext)
o Bio-fuel public transit
o Hydrokinetic Power
o Solar street lights
o Costal restoration
o Green building (LEED)
- Challenges
o Scale
o Expense $$$
o Equity
o Potential for future disasters
- What is needed is a new vision of a truly New Orleans—one that can provide a sustainable and high quality of life for all of its citizens while it works in partnership (not in futile opposition) with the natural forces that shaped it. This New Orleans can serve as a metaphor and a model for the sustainable development of western industrial society more generally.”
- “Creating a sustainable and desirable New Orleans” editorial from Elsevier
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