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Edited by Christian Lowe | Contact

Dutch Counter-Flood Tech

Plety of cities around the world are below sea level, like New Orleans. So how do they keep the waters at bay? The Times looks at the "countries with long histories of flooding [that] have turned science, technology and raw determination into ways of forestalling disaster."

dutch_rivers.jpg

After devastating floods killed nearly 2,000 people in the Netherlands, the Dutch erected a futuristic system of coastal defenses that is admired around the world today as one of the best barriers against the sea's fury - one that could withstand the kind of storm that happens only once in 10,000 years."

Linking offshore islands with dams, seawalls and other structures, the Dutch erected a kind of forward defensive shield, drastically reducing the amount of vulnerable coastline. Mr. de Haan, director of the water branch of the Road and Hydraulic Engineering Institute of the Dutch Ministry of Transport, Public Works and Water Management, said the project had the effect of shortening the coast by more than 400 miles.

For New Orleans, experts say, a similar forward defense would seal off Lake Pontchartrain from the Gulf of Mexico. That step would eliminate a major conduit by which hurricanes drive storm surges to the city's edge - or, as in the case of Katrina, through the barriers.

The Dutch also increased the height of their dikes, which now loom as much as 40 feet above the churning sea. (In New Orleans, the tallest flood walls are about half that size.) The government also erected vast complexes of floodgates that close when the weather turns violent but remain open at other times, so saltwater can flow into estuaries, preserving their ecosystems and the livelihoods that depend on them.

The Netherlands maintains large teams of inspectors and maintenance crews that safeguard the sprawling complex, which is known as Delta Works. The annual maintenance bill is about $500 million. "It's not cheap," Mr. de Haan said. "But it's not so much in relation to the gross national product. So it's a kind of insurance."

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Posted by: aoc gold at May 13, 2008 02:29 AM


Check out www.safecoast.org and find out that the coastal managers in the North Sea region are already thinking about the future. Believe me: by only constructing dams and dikes we won't help ourselves in the 21st century...

Posted by: Niels at August 22, 2006 03:58 PM


A project like the Dutch Delta works, which costed them about $8 billion dollars in the period of 1953 to 1997, is surely going to cost about triple that to apply similar engineering to Louisiana and Missisippi to protect New Orleans. Probably $24 billion or maybe even more.

Is it worth it? Its worth every dime in my opinion. We spent over $300 billion in the last 3 years on the war in Iraq alone, we surely can come up with 10% of that money in about 10 times the amount of time (it took the Dutch more then 30 years) to protect our own citizens from the irreversable effects of Global Warming.

Yes, bring on the Dutch to design the engineering. And bring on the workers from LA and MS to build it! We need Dutch engineering, Federal money, and Local employment to get this done.

Posted by: Maarten at October 5, 2005 03:53 PM


While the catastrophic effects of this years hurricane season have focused on the Gulf Coast of the United States, its impact will reach far beyond that region. Gartner's Katrina/Hurricane blog provides free analysis by Gartner experts on how enterprises are responding to the business and technology challenges caused by these events. This blog also includes free research and resource links to help organizations evaluate their contingency plans for responding to future disasters.

Posted by: Paul Denhup at September 29, 2005 10:40 AM


Intelligent Design...
I have lived in the US for almost 20 years. Why that is significant, is because I find myself regularly comparing the US I encountered at my time of immigration and the US I experience today as a resident.
Coming from Europe, where everything old is quaint, and everything contemporary is well-designed I have often stood astonished at Americas widespread disregard of its history. Im not talking about the almost propagandistic US history taught to Americas youngstersat the exclusion of world history at large. Im talking about its buildings, bridges, houses, neighborhoods. Youve seen the dilapidated streets in large cities. Neighborhoods and buildings with character left to rot, houses in Victorian style ready to fall down, or an entire city wrecked by the shoddy engineering of a bunch of brittle levees.

In a lowest-bid-wins world, when there are no higher ideals, no higher aims, no desires to preserve, to restore, to improve, everything is allowed to slowly turn into the abandoned cardboard homeless people crawl under to keep dry.

Today, theres a lot of talk about intelligent design. If you dont know what it is you can look it up. Im all for it. Foresight, rather than intelligent design was available when the first levees were built in the late 1800s, but intelligent design was still absent when their purpose was last evaluated.

If you want to attribute intelligent design to your god, thats your prerogative, but god doesnt build levees, the Dutch do. If youre more interested in attributing intelligent design to someone or something you cant see, feel, or smell, yet created the heavens and the pimple on which we live maybe youre overlooking the intelligent design that should go into every man-made project. The cars you build should not blow up and burn everyone inside, and neither should your levees break and if one does, there should be intelligent design that deals with such a what if scenario. Like, duh, a second levee, or a system of dikes, ditches, and containing walls. A system that could allow flooding of one area, but not all areas

If youre unfamiliar with the intelligent design the Dutch applied to safeguard their below sea level country from the ocean you really ought to study the Dutch Delta waterworks, especially if you are Army Corps of Engineers long associated with America's appaling slate of yearly floodings and faced with an annual review of a historical American town below sea level, like, for instance, New Orleans.

Then again, putting the protection of dry land into the hands of the Army Corps of Engineers may not be such a good idea, as their recommendations may be compromised with low bid contract awarding, resulting in a single cement wall to keep an entire ocean at bay. The Dutch on the other hand, having spared no expense built themselves a protection system that not only takes into account the threat of the elements, but also consecutive threats if the first defense fails. Systems of dikes, water management, levees, and pumps are intelligently designed to thwart as much as possible occurrences as have taken place in, lets say, Bangladesh, or New Orleans.

Did I mention Im Dutch? Imagine my growing bewilderment when at least three weeks went by after Hurricane Katrina and the demise of New Orleans before anyone (I believe it was Chris Matthews of MSNBCs Hardball) mentioned the Dutch storm-water systems.
Days later Al Franken, of The Al Franken Show on Air America, featured a Dutch ex-minister who illuminated him on what the Dutch installed to protect their country.

Now, as I write this, the levees in New Orleans are breaking again, this time under pressure from Hurricane Ritas rainfall. Is it not maddening that after 4 weeks a second flooding identical to the first is occurring? Whatever had been done to stop the first flooding apparently did not include shoring up the levees that had not broken yet.
Now, what Id like to hear next time someone mentions intelligent design, is the good news that the best heads have come together to design a practical and lasting solution for a long-ignored problem. And, this is probably hardest for Americans to accept, but think Nike, think call-centers, think Wall-Mart: if you cant get it here, go overseas and outsource. Im sure there are some excellent Dutch engineers sitting by the phone right now, ready to apply intelligent design to any dike worthy of their twiddling thumbs

2005 Rudolf Helder

Posted by: Rudolf Helder at September 25, 2005 01:38 AM


Its not that they didnt know it was a possibility, the problem lay with the fiscal responsibility and accountability within an adversareal political and economic arena.In the Netherlands a free market social democratic system is in place, the taxes are higher, and consequently the services and ammenities are a better quality as well. They appear to live 'The New Deal'dream and put its tenets into practice, where as the Roosevelt ideal appears to have died or been squandered by succesive administrations who tote corporate lines and shy away from the big questions for political expediancy or corporate financial clout. You get what you pay for, and the Dutch were smart enough to realize that collectively, through a progressive taxation policy, they could enjoy all the benifits of social cohesion without having to go off the deep end of total socialism or Rapacious Individualistic Capitalism. Maybe the American problem is the McCarthyist hangover about 'reds under the beds', if they spent a little more on taking care of eachother and a little less creating a society that has everyone looking out for themselves at the expense of those they live with, they might find that a whole raft of social benifits come there way. In the end, you get what you pay for, and sometimes you have to pay more than just the bucks.

Posted by: Richard Parker at September 21, 2005 08:13 AM


What I don't understand is the fact that I've seen a 2hr documentary on Discovery Channel about this (In where New Orleans and The Netherlands were compared in) AND sitll this could happen, while your governement states that this couldnt been foreseen...

WHY didn't anyone take action before...
If the hindsight was REALLY 20/20 then the ones looking werent looking good enough, because then they would have seen and learned from our disaster more then 50 years ago

Eric Liket, The Netherlands

Posted by: Eric Liket at September 12, 2005 07:00 AM


Byron Skinner: The Article was about flood-control technology. Got anything to add to that, or do you prefer to turn every discussion into an anti-Bush screed?

For myself, I'd prefer to learn about the technology, especially how New Orleans' situation differs from the Netherlands' and how this affects the technological options.

Posted by: pst314 at September 9, 2005 01:21 PM


Byron Skinner, that canard won't work anymore. The truth is now trickling out and it does NOT look good for Louisiana Democrats.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/09/07/AR2005090702462.html?sub=AR

In Katrinas wake, Louisiana politicians and other critics have complained about paltry funding for the Army Corps in general and Louisiana projects in particular. But over the five years of President Bushs administration, Louisiana has received far more money for Corps civil works projects than any other state, about $1.9 billion; California was a distant second with less than $1.4 billion, even though its population is more than seven times as large.

Much of that Louisiana money was spent to try to keep low-lying New Orleans dry. But hundreds of millions of dollars have gone to unrelated water projects demanded by the states congressional delegation and approved by the Corps, often after economic analyses that turned out to be inaccurate

overall, the Bush administrations funding requests for the key New Orleans flood-control projects for the past five years were slightly higher than the Clinton administrations for its past five years.

Posted by: Lou Minatti at September 8, 2005 08:05 AM


I find it has become very easy for Americans to speak out against the government in times like these; however, where were all of you years ago... hindsight is ALWAYS 20:20. True it would have been far cheaper to fix it on th front end but which project do you choose. This country is like an old house, fix which evil first? Well if we knew the answer to that, this would be a perfect world. Instead of spending so much energy on bashing the lack of action, get out there and start it yourself. A hurricane can be traced back to the beat of one butterfly's wings.

Posted by: J at September 7, 2005 01:09 PM


... and who is going to be paid a lot of that $US 24 billion?

(Probably feeling just a bit too far bitter & twisted, but sometimes I wonder just how far is too far.)

Posted by: Mez at September 7, 2005 04:43 AM


Good Evening,

Lets see, since 2001 the Bushies have removed for the Army Corps.of Engineers budget for levy repair and building in New Orleans about $143 Million. The est. cost to clean up and rebuild the infrta structure in New Orleans is around $24 Billion.

Whats wrong with this picture?

The only analogy that I can think of is not replacing that $4.95 fan belt when you replace your water pump.

ALLONS,
Byron Skinner
"Stewart's Platoon"

Posted by: Byron Skinner at September 6, 2005 10:35 PM


Lets adopt same midset for whole Gulf Coast from TX to FL & NC SC Outer Banks Islands alone.
Maybe the NE area?
I mean NYC on Manhatten is like NO, low sea level.
Imagine NYC flooded by hurricane force 5?
Time to make plans NOW.
Bring on the Dutch.

Posted by: stephen russell at September 6, 2005 09:20 PM


Lets adopt same midset for whole Gulf Coast from TX to FL & NC SC Outer Banks Islands alone.
Maybe the NE area?
I mean NYC on Manhatten is like NO, low sea level.
Imagine NYC flooded by hurricane force 5?
Time to make plans NOW.
Bring on the Dutch.

Posted by: stephen russell at September 6, 2005 09:20 PM


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