Soil, Conservation Experts to Reflect on Hurricane Katrina Disaster

The symposium, "Katrina Disaster and Sustainable Coastal Development: An Integrated Perspective and the Role of Land and Water Sciences," will include more than 10 speakers and beings begins Wed., Nov. 7 from 1:45 to 3:45 pm followed by a second session on Thurs. Nov. 8 from 8 to 10 am.

"Hurricane Katrina provided the scientific community with an unparalleled opportunity to guide both ecosystem restoration and the design of measures to protect lives and properties from violent natural events," says opening speaker Charles Groat of the Jackson School of Geosciences, University of Texas at Austin. "Since Katrina, decision makers have seemed more open to innovative scientific input and scientists have been better organized in their efforts to influence decision makers."

The first day of the symposium will focus on the storm's impact on the land, the role wetlands could play in protecting the area, and the sociopolitical and scientific processes of land and resource management.

"Rapid degradation of the Mississippi River delta and climate change are placing the physical and socioeconomic sustainability of coastal Louisiana in doubt," says speaker William L. Jenkins of Louisiana State University. "We must pursue aggressive coastal restoration or face the daunting implications of inaction."

Another key aspect to understanding and preparing for environmental disasters is sharing information about resources. William Puckett, Christopher Smith, and Karl Hipple of the Natural Resources Conservation Service of the U.S. Department of Agriculture will address the importance of generating custom products, such as interpretative maps with soil suitability data, and training response agency personnel how to properly interpret soils information related to disaster. Additional speakers will include Ed Link, University of Maryland, Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, and Robert Dean, University of Florida, Civil and Coastal Engineering.

The second day of the symposium will take a broader look at hurricane patterns over the years, global climate change and Louisiana's ongoing recovery and future. Steven Hamburg of the Ecology and Evolutionary Biology Department at Brown University will discuss the impact of a storm's frequency and intensity on ecosystem resistance and resilience. Increased storm intensity, for example, might impact the resistance of Gulf Coast forests. Chris Renschler of the University of Buffalo and National Center for Geographic Information and Analysis will address the potential of integrated natural resources management as a tool for managing natural disasters.

"Field studies, remote sensing, Geographic Information Systems and process-based environmental models are increasingly used in combination to support decision- and policy-making in natural resources or natural hazards management," Renschler says. "Communication between the various disciplines and stakeholders involved is key to successful implementation of an integrated management plan."

Rattan Lal of Ohio State University and the Carbon Management & Sequestration Center will concentrate on opportunities for soil carbon sequestration to mitigate the ongoing effects of global warming. Additional speakers will include John Logan of Brown University's Department of Sociology, Bob Jacobsen of the URS Corporation, and G. Paul Kemp of the Baton Rouge National Audubon Society.

Day one of the symposium will be on Wed., Nov. 7 from 1:45 to 3:45 pm in Room R02 of the Convention Center. Another two-hour session will follow at 8 am on Thurs., Nov. 8 in Room 207.

The ASA-CSSA-SSSA annual meetings will be Nov. 4-8 at the Ernest N. Morial Convention Center in New Orleans. More than 4,000 scientists and professionals from around the world will attend research presentations on climate change, urban planning, crop production, hazardous waste, human health, bioenergy and more. For more information, go to http://www.acsmeetings.org.

The American Society of Agronomy (ASA) www.agronomy.org, the Crop Science Society of America (CSSA) www.crops.org and the Soil Science Society of America (SSSA) www.soils.org are educational organizations helping their 10,000+ members advance the disciplines and practices of agronomy, crop and soil sciences by supporting professional growth and science policy initiatives, and by providing quality, research-based publications and a variety of member services.