LOUISIANA’S coastal ecosystem is in trouble. Under siege from erosion and rising sea levels, at present rates of degradation it will be gone within 50 years. That would be bad news for biodiversity, for the seafood industry and for the city of New Orleans.
This catastrophe can be averted, but opinion is divided on how. On one side are the traditional conservationists who believe in allowing nature to take its course with minimal intervention, fearing that too much could backfire. On the other are those who advocate engineering solutions, from the use of artificial reefs to shore up sinking sediment to novel, hardier breeds of grasses.
If the latter get the upper hand, Louisiana will see the first big test of ecosystem engineering (see “Louisiana revival: Eco-engineering on a giant scale”). The prospect of tinkering with nature is clearly scary to some people – though what is and isn’t “natural” is not always clear-cut. What matters above all is finding ways to preserve or even increase species diversity. If the Louisiana experiment goes ahead, the key will be to take every precaution to ensure that it works. An engineered ecosystem is surely better than a collapsed one.
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