A proposed $31 billion project of levees and sea gates known as the “Ike Dike” is the official preferred plan to protect the Houston-Galveston region from devastating storm surge, but Rice University researchers are raising significant concerns about that plan and now offer an alternative.

The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and the Texas General Land Office released the first phase of a coastal protection study last month. Plans for the ambitious project, a complex 70-mile system running from High Island to the San Luis Pass, are still at least a decade away from completion. The corps and the land office expect to release a final study in 2021 before sending it to Congress to consider funding the project.

A group of Rice professors are, however, among a handful of political, engineering and environmental experts who plan to raise significant questions about the proposed barrier during the project’s public comment period.

GREEN LIGHT: Army Corps of Engineers gives nod to $31 billion "Ike Dike" plan

Jim Blackburn, a Rice professor and co-director of the university’s Severe Storm Prediction, Education & Evacuation from Disasters (SSPEED) Center, says the Corps’ initial Ike Dike study was incomplete because it did not account for the more powerful storms that have swept through the Gulf Coast and the Caribbean in recent years. The Corps’ coastal plan, called the Ike Dike, is named for the 2008 hurricane that caused more than $30 billion in damages to the Houston-Galveston region.

Hurricanes more powerful than Ike, including Harvey, Irma and Maria all in 2017, had unique characteristics rarely seen in major storms, Blackburn said.

Ike Dike timeline 2008: Hurricane Ike makes landfall in Galveston as a Category 2 storm, bringing 17-foot storm surges and causing more than $30 billion worth of damage. 2009: Bill Merrell, a professor at Texas A&M University at Galveston, develops the “Ike Dike” concept — a coastal barrier designed to protect the Houston-Galveston region from future storm surges. 2015: U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and the Texas General Land Office begin work on a Coastal Texas Protection and Restoration Study Draft Integrated Feasibility Report and Environmental Impact Statement, expected to take 5.5 years. 2018: The Corps and the land office release the initial phase of a coastal protection study and draft environmental impact statement, selecting a modified version of the “Ike Dike” concept as the preferred coastal barrier alignment. Estimated cost: $23 billion to $31 billion. 2021: The final study of the coastal barrier is expected to be issued by the Army Corps of Engineers and General Land Office and the recommendation sent to Congress to consider funding.

Read More

“The storms that are being analyzed by the Corps are, in my opinion, too small,” Blackburn said. “They’re just not making landfall at the worst locations, with the type of wind fields and characteristics we’re seeing. I can’t remember if it was (Hurricanes) Irma or Maria, it was an Ike-like storm with Category 5 winds. That’s not supposed to happen.”

Larry Dunbar, a project manager at the SSPEED Center, added that the modeling system the Corps used to predict the effects of storms on its proposed barrier was outdated and that the study did not account for the worst possible storm tracts that could hit the Houston area.

“We said we’re using the updated information because that’s what we do, and (the Army Corps of Engineers) said, ‘That’s fine, we’re gonna use the old model because that’s what the flood insurance study work was based on and we want to be consistent with that,’” Dunbar said. “I can’t argue with that, but we at least now know what’s the difference between the two models, what effect it has, its effect on larger storms, you know it, I know it.”

Blackburn also believes the Corps’ proposed barrier leave parts of Harris County — most notably the Port of Houston and the sprawling industrial and petrochemical facilities along Galveston Bay — vulnerable.

“We think that there is too much remaining surge exposure, and it’s a valid concern, both with regard to the ship channel, to the Bayport Industrial Complex and with regard to the Clear Lake area,” Blackburn said.

The two protection proposals

The Corps’ alternative proposal includes a navigation gate placed along the Houston Ship Channel and smaller gates built near Clear Creek and Dickinson Bayou, but does not go as far as the SSPEED Center’s proposal for a mid-bay gate to protect Galveston Bay.

The Galveston Bay Park plan, first proposed by the SSPEED Center in 2015, includes similar protection features as the Corps proposal for protecting Bolivar Peninsula and Galveston, but adds a vital component: a 25-foot, mid-bay barrier system that would protect the industrial complexes and densely populated areas in the west and northwest sections of Galveston Bay.

Blackburn views the mid-bay gate as part of a bifurcated system — an internal barrier and a coastal barrier — that would not preclude the Ike Dike concept favored by the Corps and political leadership on the local, state and federal levels. He called the gate a “highly complementary” feature to the extensive barrier the Corps put forth, but one that could be built in half the time at a fraction of the cost — estimated from $3 billion to $5 billion.

“We think this alternative needs to be permitted,” Blackburn said. “We’re going to be urging Harris County to investigate filing a permit application. We are going to argue that to any governmental entity that is interested. I think we need options. If all of our eggs are in a $30 billion federal appropriation, that just sounds too risky to me.”

Harris County Judge Ed Emmett and Houston Mayor Sylvester Turner have thrown their political weight behind the coastal barrier — Turner called on “all of our government partners” to back the Corps’ proposal, while Emmett has repeatedly said the time for debate on the Ike Dike has long since passed. It remains to be seen whether Blackburn would be able to secure the political support to move the mid-bay gate forward. After serving 11 years, Republican Emmett was defeated in his re-election bid this week by Lina Hidalgo during a Democratic sweep of most countywide races.

The project has also been hailed by the Gulf Coast Community Protection and Recovery District, an entity formed in the wake of Hurricane Ike to help Brazoria, Chambers, Galveston, Harris, Jefferson and Orange counties develop plans and conduct studies to alleviate damage from future storms. The district’s Board of Directors is made up of the county judge of each participating county and three additional appointed members serving three-year terms.

“You’re talking about a region hundreds of miles from the Sabine River all the way down to the Rio Grande,” said Robert Eckels, the former Harris County judge who serves as president of the recovery district. “The numbers do not seem, on their surface, to be outside of what you might expect on a project of this scale.”

Environmental pitfalls

Ironically, given the price tag assigned to the Ike Dike, the Corps of Engineers cited the SSPEED Center’s mid-bay gate’s cost as one of the reasons it declined to back the proposal as its “tentatively selected plan,” as well as the impact the project would have on oyster beds in Galveston Bay.

“It is cutting through probably the most densely inhabited oysters in the bay and that’s one of the reasons that we had to screen it out,” said Kelly Burks-Copes, the project manager for the Army Corps’ study.

But the Corps proposal is not without its own environmental pitfalls. Environmentalists are concerned that the Corps’ barrier would restrict the flow of water in and out of Galveston Bay, potentially reducing salinity and affecting marine life. Organizations like the Galveston Bay Foundation have also noted that not all of the bay-facing industrial facilities are adequately protected from storm surges.

It’s one of the reasons that the SSPEED Center’s mid-bay gate has gained some traction as a viable alternative.

“(The Galveston Bay Park plan) is potentially more attractive because it’s cheaper and could potentially get done in a shorter period of time, but it also doesn’t have the big gate in front of the pass in Galveston Bay,” said Bob Stokes, the president of the Galveston Bay Foundation. “That one would not be without impacts so I’m not necessarily saying that’s a preferred alternative for us, but to me it’s got some possibilities for sure.”

Helen Drummond, the executive director of the Houston Audubon Society, is also concerned that the placement of the barriers along Bolivar Peninsula —the exact location of which has yet to be determined — might infringe on the world-renowned migratory and shorebird sanctuaries on the peninsula that the Audubon Society owns.

“We had concerns from the beginning about the environmental analysis being done so that we could make an effective and informed evaluation about which (barrier alignment) we thought would be most productive,” Drummond said.

Drummond echoes the view of many environmentalists that armoring natural coastal areas like beaches, wetlands, coastal prairie, and the bay itself to protect them from storms is “contradictory,” given that reinforcing those natural barriers can assist in mitigation, and also supports looking at more affordable options that target high-risk areas of concern along the ship channel and the western edge of Galveston Bay.

Even the original architect of the “Ike Dike” concept — Dr. Bill Merrell, a Texas A&M University Galveston professor, agrees that wetlands and natural coastal barriers should be protected, but added that the farther off the coast the barriers are placed, the more likely it will impede on residential areas. The Corps’ study cites an estimate that more than 1,000 homes or businesses may need to be bought and replaced along the coast to make room for the barrier.

“There’s a couple of areas where we’ll enter into a debate with (the Army Corps of Engineers) on that and suggest approaches where we certainly don’t want to destroy any wetlands if we don’t have to,” Merrell said. “I don’t think we have to. I think they’ve done that because it’s cheaper to put the barriers as far back as possible, but you do sacrifice all the houses in the front. That’s pretty tough.”

Whether Congress will have the stomach to fund a barrier that costly, proponents of the Corps barrier acknowledge will be an uphill battle, and time is a factor. The final Corps study is expected to be completed by 2021. By that time, the Houston-Galveston region could very well see another major storm of Ike or Harvey proportions or worse.

“It’s a process. It’s a process I don’t like, but there’s only two things that’s going to trigger funding for that,” said Bob Mitchell, president of the Bay Area Houston Economic Partnership, and a supporter of the Corps proposal. “One, is we have a disaster we’ve been afraid of for quite some time, and number two, wait until the study’s completed.”

Staff writer Zach Despart contributed to this report.

nick.powell@chron.com