Abstract
Using the Mississippi River as a tool for restoration has been a key element of restoration planning in Louisiana for decades. The results of allowing river water and sediment back into the coastal system are manifested in a number of places in present day Louisiana, with additional plans for large scale sediment and water diversions from the Mississippi River. Many previous numerical modeling studies have focused on sediment delivery to Louisiana estuaries. This study examines the effects of river diversions on salinity gradients in receiving estuarine basins. The Integrated Compartment Model, a planning-level model that simulates multi-decadal change in estuarine hydrodynamics and wetland systems under assumed sea-level rise scenarios, was used to assess the estuarine salinity gradient under potential management regimes. The simulations for current conditions are compared to a future 50-year simulation with additional diversions, as well as cases with a variety of diversion options. This modeling analysis shows that without additional action, 50-years of sea-level rise could result in substantial increases in salinity throughout the Mississippi Delta Plain estuaries. This can be largely offset with additional large river diversions which can maintain variable salinity gradients throughout the estuary basins.
Highlights
The impacts from projected future sea-level rise are expected to be extensive for the World’sRiver Deltas, with the loss of land and habitat diversity threatening the inhabitants, resources and ecology of these low-lying coastal areas [1,2]
The Integrated Compartment Model (ICM) is a planning-level model that was developed by integrating into a single modeling platform several models that had previously been used for coastal zone planning and research in Louisiana [23]
The simulations described here show, for the estuarine basins of the Mississippi Delta Plain, that the effects of the sea-level rise decades into the future are potentially dramatic, but the effects on the estuarine salinity gradient varies according to the landscape setting
Summary
The impacts from projected future sea-level rise are expected to be extensive for the World’sRiver Deltas, with the loss of land and habitat diversity threatening the inhabitants, resources and ecology of these low-lying coastal areas [1,2]. River’s deltaic coastal plain [5] due to a variety of human-induced and natural factors, such as rising sea levels, levee construction along the Mississippi River, sediment compaction due to pressure. Reconnecting the river with the delta plain is widely recognized as an essential tool in the future sustainability of the wetland-dominated coastal ecosystem [11,12,13,14], and this approach has been central to restoration planning in Louisiana for decades [15]. Future managed reconnections are usually in the form of sediment diversions These are structures with gates built in the existing river levee system that would be operated to allow river water, sediment and nutrients to flow into the wetlands adjacent to the river to build new land and sustain existing wetlands
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