terra central

Red River Crests and Falls

They’re getting really good at it, fighting floods, that is. The National Weather Service predicted a crest of 38 feet and that’s the wall height the dike crews built. The River crested at 37-feet.

The dike building crews, thousands of them, mostly high school and college kids, did it for free, or for coffee and donuts, a ham and cheese sandwich, something like that. Where’s their bailout? I say give it to them.

And a pound of ground beef for the dog, too.

More Sandbags: Fargo-Moorhead Braces for Major Flood

For the second year in a row, soils, geomorphology, and snowpack set up a major flood risk.

The Red River of the North has “issues” that tend to make life “interesting” for those who live near it and depend on it. The Red is a fairly small river in a large watershed. The Red River Valley is not really a river valley at all, but a broad, flat lake bottom formed by Glacial Lake Agassiz.

The fertile soils of the Red River Valley developed from clayey (smectitic) glacial drift largely derived from the Pierre Shale. These sediments, known as the Sherack Formation, are parent materials for the widespread Fargo silty clay (Fine, smectitic, frigid Typic Epiaquerts). These soils are poorly drained and the high-activity smectite clay shrinks and swells as it wets and dries. The force of the expanding clay soil has no problem cracking basement walls. Excavating around foundations, straightening and bracing basement walls is a good business in Fargo-Moorhead. If you want to sell a house, get ready for a building inspector to tell you to fix your foundation.

Because the Red River flows north, it tends to thaw first at the south end and ice-jam at the north end, causing water to back up at the south end of the valley. Post-glacial isostatic uplift is greater at the north end of the valley, where the glacial ice was thicker, so the valley is gradually tipping north to south, from Pembina toward Wahpeton. As the estimable North Dakota State Geologist John Bluemle writes

Because the amount of uplift was so much greater at Pembina than it was in the south at Wahpeton, the gradient of the Red River has decreased markedly since its route became established. Since Lake Agassiz drained from North Dakota about 9,000 years ago, the Red River has meandered over an increasingly broad floodplain. Flooding is a recurring problem along portions of the Red River.

So, because the diminished river gradient caused by isostatic rebound tends to back water up at the south end of the valley, and ice jams up north partially block river flow, and the clay-rich soils plowed and left bare over the winter let snow melt run off like soup on a plate, Fargo-Moorhead gets ready for another flood.

And the flooded fat clays in the soil will crack more foundations, and the basement walls will crack and leak, and the wall-jacking contractors will have work again next summer.

Summers are real nice out there.

Methane Venting From East Siberian Arctic Shelf

As a greenhouse gas, methane is 30 times more potent than carbon dioxide.

According to University of Alaska Arctic researchers Natalia Shakhova and Igor Semiletov, methane gas is venting from the East Siberian Arctic Shelf (ESAS) at a surprisingly high rate. The vents are coming through leaks in permafrost, which forms a cap over methane stored in deeper sediments.

While permafrost is generally viewed as a terrestrial soil, it actually extends offshore beneath a broad area of shallow marine sediments. This area of marine permafrost, about 2 million square kilometers, is the most unstable in the Arctic after several years of warming temperatures.

In the video Shakhova indicates the rate of methane venting at the ESAS equals the methane emitted currently by the rest of the global ocean.

Northern Plains Prepare for Another Flood

Residents in the Missouri River basin are getting ready for another spring flood. Heavy snow and cold temperatures in the Northern Plains are setting up for potential ice jams on major rivers. Here, a crop duster spreads coal dust on the Platte River near Ashland, Nebraska. The black dust absorbs solar radiation and converts it to heat, which helps melt the ice.

Source: U.S. Army Corps of Engineers Omaha District

Wisconsin Bill Favors Local Renewable Energy

Wisconsin bill would promote small-scale distributed renewable power generation.

While the deeply-divided Congress looks incapable of passing any serious legislation, states are moving ahead with renewable energy initiatives, particularly states that don’t mine coal or drill much oil and gas.

Wisconsin’s Clean Energy Jobs Act (AB 649/SB 450) was introduced January 7, 2010. It proposes major energy reforms recommended by Governor Doyle’s Global Warming Task Force. The bill isn’t just about climate change mitigation, though, it’s about investing in the state. If enacted the bill would:

1. Raise the renewable energy standard to 25% by 2025.
2. Establish renewable energy buy-back rates.
3. Include renewable biogas from Dairy operations
4. Requires 10% of energy production from in-state renewables by 2025.
5. Recommendation for zero-net energy usage in new construction by 2030.

According to a summary prepared by RENEW Wisconsin:

“The legislation would require the PSC to order electric utilities to purchase renewable energy, under certain terms and conditions, from renewable energy facilities that are constructed after the effective date of the PSC’s order. Such ART orders must include the following:

* A maximum limit on the generating capacity for qualifying facilities.
In ordering ARTs, the Commission is charged with meeting the purpose of “maximizing the development of small-scale, distributed, renewable generation technologies without unreasonable impacts on electric utility rates.”

The bill, if passed would be one of the most aggressive renewable energy packages found in the United States and mean building hundreds or even thousands of wind turbines by 2025.