Valuable Wasteland
Why the preservation of swamps and bogs could hold the key to stopping global warming.By Adam Welti
May 23, 2008
Cranes depend on wetlands for their habitat. (iStockPhoto.com)
This time of year, cranes fly north overhead in eastern France, a luxury that the French may not have if the country’s valuable natural wetland habitat is destroyed. The cranes migrate from their winter climates in northern Africa to their natural summer habitat in northern Europe. Like clockwork every spring, the cranes migrate through France, stopping over in a local wetland area—flying out to low-lying areas during the day to find food and back to the lake bed at night. Not only is the wetland area vital to the migration of the cranes, but it attracts visitors and tourists to the local communities that hold an annual festival in October to watch the migration of the elegant birds back to their winter habitat.
While wetlands are generally not a hot topic of debate, recent attention to climate change reveals their importance to cities, especially those on coasts and along major bodies of water (including major river systems). These important ecological areas for plants and animals are falling prey to the changes in climate as well as serving as a potential solution to climate change. Their protection could be crucial to reducing the long-term impacts of climate change and water shortages.
What are wetlands?
Wetlands are swampy areas that can intersect with normal wooded areas, and you may even have accidentally encountered one during a scenic hike, using choice words to describe surprise at wet shoes and socks. These areas of land, sometimes serving their purpose only seasonally or during major weather events, serve a vital role in the regulation of water. Wetlands are those areas of land that contain soils that are generally saturated with moisture. They’re more commonly referred to as marshes, swamps, or bogs.
Wetlands serve a variety of functions ranging from short- or long-term water storage to the moderation of groundwater discharge. These areas filter and store water—acting as a sort of sponge during heavy rain and melt water times of year, and add aesthetic value to communities. Wetlands help to regulate water flow, often providing a key source of replenishment to our groundwater systems.
Additionally, coastal wetlands, along the coasts of our major oceans and seas, help to mitigate the effects of major storm waves. The Florida Everglades National Park, which covers approximately 1.5 million acres, is a prime example of wetlands that help with the effects of storm water. A one acre wetland, one foot deep, can hold approximately 330,000 gallons of water.
These systems serve as habitat for many bird species including ducks and other migrating waterfowl, like the cranes—both seasonally and year-round. According to the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources, nearly 43 percent of endangered or threatened plants and animals in the United States are dependent upon wetlands for survival.
How are we losing wetlands?
For decades, we have been draining and filling in wetlands to serve other purposes. In the 1940s, following increased development pressure in and around the Everglades, the Army Corps of Engineers began regulating water flow through a series of canals and dams. The network helped to provide constant water supplies for urban and agricultural needs, but the wetlands took the brunt of the burden. These areas have historically been viewed as wastelands—available to be exploited. There are three main causes eating away at wetlands: transformation of wetlands into agricultural production, urban development, and loss due to rising sea levels or drought.
A housing development in my hometown, Plainview, Minn., filled in a wetland area to make room for buildings. As new homes were constructed, they suffered from frequent basement flooding even after fairly mild rain showers thanks to the land’s former status as a wetland. Sump pumps, the pumps that normally help to keep water away from the foundation, could not keep up with incoming water; the land area is naturally low and contains moist soils. This has lead to costly and frequent homeowner’s insurance claims and constant basement maintenance.
Carol Auer, an oceanographer with the National Ocean and Atmospheric Administration, pointed out that wetlands serve as natural barriers to storm surges. "When walls are built between homes and beaches or wetlands, to protect development, they actually put the homes in more danger in the long run,” Auer contended in an interview with NPR last January. “The walls block wetlands and beaches from expanding inland, so with a wall on one side and encroaching water on the other, in the end, the wetlands disappear. Homes are then left vulnerable, right at the edge of the water.”
Global warming has a large impact on these important ecological areas. The rising sea levels we’ve experienced in the last few years thanks melting ice caps are causing wetlands to be inundated with more water throughout the year than the wetland is used to, and the resulting natural ecosystem of plants and animals change significantly. This means wetlands lose their normal function of regulating water flow. Droughts caused by global warming have a similarly bad effect. In areas of the United States and other countries like Mali and Niger in west central Africa, which has suffered from years of significant drought, the decrease in rainfall is causing wetland loss. This means wetlands lose the ability to provide precious replenishment to the groundwater system and natural river systems.
As we develop more land into agriculture and urban systems, we continue to move or remove wetlands. These land areas are a vital piece of the biodiversity puzzle—keeping our diversity of plant and animal life intact.
What legislation is in place to protect wetlands?
Wetlands management in the United States is covered under the Clean Water Act, enacted in 1977 to protect what was then approximately 76 million acres of wetlands. This law outlined that the enforcement of the act should be a shared responsibility undertaken by several entities including the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, the Environmental Protection Agency, Natural Resource Conservation Service, and often through agencies at the state and local level (including local watershed districts).
The main provision that outlines the protection of wetlands is the no net loss provision (pdf). It states that any proposed action, such as construction, should try to avoid impacting wetlands. If this is not possible, the project must minimize its impact on the wetland. And, if this is not possible, the loss must be mitigated. Mitigation means a developer needs to restore or recreate artificial wetlands in the same amount (or more) of those lost, with the same ecological and habitat function as those damaged or destroyed. The law requires replacement of lost wetlands to be two acres of restored or replaced wetlands for every one acre lost, in hopes of creating a net gain in wetland areas. But the reality is that many wetlands are filled in without replacement, and the provisions of this act are rarely enforced.
Other protection legislation was passed by Congress in the 1980s. The legislation, more commonly known as Swampbuster, penalizes farmers who convert wetlands for agricultural production. This legislation was passed as part of the Federal Food Security Act, but unfortunately it doesn’t forbid farmers from draining wetlands, but merely penalizes those who do by withholding their benefits from the federal farm program.
In 2000, the federal government announced plans to begin the restoration of the Everglades to help it resume its somewhat original function. The Corps drew up a 25-year management plan which was projected to cost around $8 billion. The work included removing some of the canals and dams that were built beginning in the 1940s. The actual implementation of the program has been slow to take hold. Most recently, funding for the program and other water related projects was vetoed by President Bush and overridden by Congress in late 2007. The costs for the restoration are to be shared by the federal budget and the state of Florida. The most recent bill passage appropriates $2 billion from the federal budget—falling short of the total approximated project cost.
Unfortunately all too often little is done to ensure that wetlands are preserved in their natural state or adequately restored. Economics drive federal regulations. Wetland protection is of little importance. Many environmental groups, conservation and hunting groups, such as the Izaak Walton League, Ducks Unlimited and The Trust for Public Land, are calling attention to the fact the main provision of the Clean Water Act isn’t being fully enforced.
The solutions
The solutions to stopping the shrinkage of wetlands begin with an adequate assessment of current wetlands using a Geographic Information Systems analyses. Once areas have been identified and cataloged, the wetlands need to be monitored and a management plan must be put into place. With the existing agencies which help to enforce the Clean Water Act at the national, state and local levels, this could be done efficiently.
Wetlands are not only affected negatively by climate change, they can also serve as a potential solution to its causes. The plants in these ecosystems, in addition to filtering water and serving as habitat for animals, can store significant amount of greenhouse gases (in the form of carbon and methane gas), helping to mitigate the impacts of increased carbon dioxide emissions, according to Wetlands International. Wetland protection must be a vital piece of the local, state, national, and international set of proposals and solutions, whether as a part of agricultural legislation, urban planning, or carbon trading mechanisms.
The NRCS must enforce existing regulations such as Swampbuster and tighten exemptions to wetland laws. No-net loss goals need to move beyond ideas to become reality. And finally, funding must be dedicated to ensure agencies can effectively carry out their tasks of identifying, monitoring, and managing wetlands, as well as beginning restoration of those areas lost.
In addition to those benefits we all receive from the storage of rain water—which helps to recharge our drinking water systems and mitigate flood damage—wetlands can prove invaluable in ways we may not realize. The cranes have proven to be an economic stimulus to eastern France not only from the festival but also from the numerous wildlife photographers who visit the area to photograph their annual voyage. We are all interconnected and each part of our natural landscape serves an important function. We must work to ensure we can live within our landscape and conserve wetlands that are a vitally important part of a functioning planet.
Adam Welti teaches English in France and served in Morocco for the Peace Corps. He graduated from the University of Minnesota in 2004.
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Comments
Uuhhh…We have yet to prove that man has any effect on the temperature of the earth.
— Phil - Jun 24, 03:50 PM - #Here is something you won’t often hear: The peak of global warming was 1998. The earth is not cooling down, just like it did last time, and the time before, and the time before…
Sorry…typo.
— Phil - Jun 24, 03:51 PM - #I mean’t to say “...the earth IS cooling down…”