A New (Ab)Normal On The Rivers

We reported earlier that this year’s dredging expenses by the Corps of Engineers to keep channels open in this season of low water would total about $20 million – versus $8 million the year before. Everyone agrees that the Corps and the Coast Guard have done a splendid job with inadequate resources. The Coast Guard is waiting for up to 16 new contracted buoy tenders to be built. We are being told that the low water is likely to extend into the winter.

If chronic low water becomes a new normal, annual dredging expenses are likely to be closer to the former figure than the latter.

Even if we get enough rain next season not to repeat this year’s low water, climatologists are telling us that the climate is becoming more volatile around the world. Extremes of both kinds—droughts and floods—are growing more frequent. Insurers are repricing climate risk premiums.

English writer Samuel Johnson wrote, “Depend upon it, sir, when a man knows he is to be hanged in a fortnight, it concentrates his mind wonderfully.” The Mississippi River and its tributaries—i.e., all of us who depend on them – face, not a hanging, but a new (ab)normal that brings added annual expenses. We hope that will help concentrate minds in Congress.

Long-term projections released in 2021 showed that, between 2020 and 2050, U.S. freight activity will grow by 50 percent in tonnage to 28.7 billion tons and will double in value to $36.2 trillion (in 2017 dollars).

One question that some believe should be on the table is whether or not the Corps should use its authority—granted by Congress in 1944 but never funded or used—to dredge the Middle Mississippi navigation channel to a permanent authorized depth of 12 feet rather than the current 9 feet.

Would it be feasible? How expensive would it be? Would Congress go along with the funding? Would we have the capacity?

There are no answers to these questions right now. But shouldn’t we at least be having that discussion?