Water Bill Will Benefit Ports, Locks and More

Congress is poised to give the nation's water infrastructure a funding boost, benefiting commerce.

By Ed Maixner, Editor, The Kiplinger Agriculture Letter

Elizabeth Banks, Intern, The Kiplinger Letters

August 28, 2007

A slew of new water projects is on tap throughout the U.S., courtesy of $21 billion in new federal spending that's about to get the thumbs-up from Congress.

Lawmakers will pass a bill this fall authorizing the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to oversee new construction and renovation work on more than 800 water infrastructure endeavors. The bill includes $3.5 billion for Gulf Coast areas ravaged by Hurricanes Katrina and Rita in 2005 as well as $800,000 for the development of a tsunami warning system on the East Coast.

The legislation has something for nearly everyone, prompting President Bush to lambaste it as excessive pork spending. But to shippers, port officials and others, it allows for much needed and long overdue improvements to critical water infrastructure, though the projects must still be funded through the annual congressional appropriations process. Although Bush wants to veto the bill, he won't because a veto would be quickly overriden by Congress, where there are few dissenting votes.

Numerous intended port and lock improvements will be a boost for commerce. Ray Pontiff, director of the Port of Iberia in Louisiana, has been pressing for six years to get $120 million to deepen the Acadiana Channel, an improvement that he sees as essential to the economic future of the Mississippi River port. Components of offshore drilling rigs are made at the port, he says, and the channel's draft is too shallow to accommodate the transport of larger components needed for most modern offshore rigs. Without a deeper channel, the community's components industry would no longer be competitive, Pontiff says.

Congress will also authorize $2 billion for the construction of seven new river locks on the Upper Mississippi and Illinois rivers, a part of the critical Mississippi River system. Midwest farm and agribusiness interests have pressed for the locks for decades. No surprise: Nearly 60% of U.S. exports of corn, soybeans and wheat, overall, are shipped via barges down the Mississippi River. The new locks will allow strings of 15 barges, 1100 feet end to end, to pass through without having to be separated -- twice the current length limit.

Although cost-benefit estimates vary on the locks project, some economic arguments are compelling. Jacqueline Taylor of the National Corn Growers Association says that a string of 15 barges can transport the same volume of grain as 870 semitrucks. So, creating the locks would take a lot of truck traffic off the highways and save on diesel fuel needed to run the trucks, she notes.

Projects in New York state include major dredging at the Port of New York/New Jersey, and a broad effort to improve flood protection and repair environmental damages in the Susquehanna River and Upper Delaware River watershed. Add to those works a fistful of beach rebuilding and shoreline projects, including one to protect the 211-year-old Montauk Point Lighthouse from the encroaching ocean. And with $25 million, the Corps will work with the state and fisheries to improve habitat for oysters and other shellfish in the Long Island Sound area.

In Florida, three projects worth $2 billion are all focused on restoring the Everglades. One, the Indian River Lagoon project, is intended to increase the natural storage of water along reaches of the Indian River by creating reservoirs, storm water treatment areas and restoring 43,000 acres of wetlands. Michael B. Rogalski, the Corps of Engineers' director for Indian River Lagoon, says the project will mean real change for the better. "The delicate balance of fresh- and saltwater in the lagoon and estuary will be restored, polluted water will be treated and depleted habitats will be revitalized," he says.

Another $2 billion is earmarked for California. Among the planned projects: A $30-million ecosystem restoration of the Salton Sea east of San Diego and more riverbank protection work on the Sacramento River.

Recreational areas -- parks and piers on rivers, reservoirs and ocean beaches --will also benefit from the legislation.

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