Louisiana TIG Opportunity for Preliminary Public Engagement Restoration Plan #9: Chandeleur Islands Restoration

The Deepwater Horizon oil spill was the largest maritime oil spill in U.S. history. It resulted in the discharge of millions of barrels of oil into the Gulf of Mexico. Under the Oil Pollution Act (OPA), each party responsible for a vessel or facility from which oil is discharged, or which poses the substantial threat of a discharge, is liable for, among other things, removal costs and damages for injury to, destruction of, loss, or loss of use of natural resources, including the reasonable cost of assessing the damage. Pursuant to OPA, federal and state natural resource trustees, including the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, the Department of the Interior, the Environmental Protection Agency, the U.S. Department of Agriculture, and trustee agencies from the states of Florida, Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana, and Texas, were charged with assessing and restoring for injuries to affected Gulf resources.

Under a global settlement reached on April 4, 2016, the Trustees released the Programmatic Damage Assessment and Restoration Plan/Programmatic Environmental Impact Statement (PDARP/PEIS). The settlement agreement includes a funding schedule that will extend through 2031. During this timeframe the trustees will provide many opportunities for public participation, including the opportunity to submit project ideas and proposals and to comment on draft restoration plans.

The Louisiana Trustee Implementation Group is preparing to integrate ongoing efforts under the Regionwide Trustee Implementation Group's Chandeleur Islands, LA Component Engineering and Design (E&D) project (DIVER ID 289e) into the development of a future Restoration Plan for the Chandeleur Islands. That future Restoration Plan would address the restoration and conservation of natural resources injured as a result of the 2010 Deepwater Horizon oil spill.

Restoration of the Chandeleur Islands would address a diverse suite of injuries to multiple resources and loss of services caused by the oil spill and could be funded out of allocations for several Restoration Types identified by the Deepwater Horizon Trustees. The ecosystem-level Restoration Approaches that could be applied to restoration of the Chandeleur Islands would benefit a broad array of potentially injured resources and services they provide. The upcoming LA Trustees' restoration plan could include a range of activities that could be funded through additional funding streams, leveraging greater benefits for Chandeleur Islands resources.

The Louisiana Trustee Implementation Group has prepared the Opportunity for Preliminary Public Engagement to provide the public information about ongoing data collection and engineering and design efforts and to seek input regarding potential Restoration Types, Approaches, and Techniques that could be evaluated in its upcoming restoration plan #9 for the Chandeleur Islands. To provide an opportunity for preliminary public engagement before beginning work on the draft Restoration Plan #9, the Trustees will accept comments on this document through February 15, 2024.

Document Content:

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