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ABOUT CREATE NBS
Project motivation
The Gulf Coast, with its picturesque shores and vital ecosystems, has long been a hub of industry, commerce, and culture in the United States. Over the decades, the Gulf Coast has witnessed the rise of numerous industrial facilities, chemical plants, and oil refineries, which have contributed significantly to the local economy but also raised environmental concerns. Many petrochemical facilities, including oil and gas infrastructure, are concentrated along the Gulf Coast of Texas and Louisiana.
The Gulf Coast is vulnerable to natural disasters such as hurricanes and flooding due to its low-lying topography and the effects of climate change. Episodic storms, heavy rainfall, flooding, and sea level rise are all expected to increase with rising global temperatures, heightening the risk of severe flooding for communities, infrastructure, and ecosystems. Simultaneously, aging industrial infrastructure, including chemical storage facilities, poses significant risks of chemical spills and hazardous exposure events, endangering both the environment and public health. Hurricanes Katrina and Harvey have demonstrated petrochemical facilities’ vulnerability to storms, with flooding-related damage triggering release of petroleum products and chemical contaminants into the air, waterways, and surrounding neighborhoods.
Nature-based solutions (NBS) have been shown to reduce flooding through sequestering rainfall and slowing surface runoff, slowing inland water transfer of storm surge, reducing wave force and height, and blocking storm debris. Furthermore, increased exposure to natural areas and vegetated open space has been shown to be associated significantly with improved health outcomes such as reduced mortality, morbidity, stress, and mental fatigue. Despite growing interest in NBS, there has been limited research to assess their potential to mitigate toxic chemical releases due to flooding.
This study has been guided by 4 main research questions:
How have historical and recent environmental releases of pollutants affected contaminant loading in marine organisms?
Which industrial facilities pose the greatest environmental risk, given their flood vulnerability, as well as the exposure and hazard potential the chemicals present on-site?
Based on potential sources of industrial environmental releases due to flooding, what is the fate and transport of these chemicals in Galveston Bay and how does it affect Gulf ecosystems?
What are the optimal Nature Based Solutions and locations for reducing flood risk and/or transport of contaminants?
The study team represents an assemblage of national, regional, and local experts from academia and environmental policy advocacy organizations:
Environmental Defense Fund’s team of scientists and policy experts applied experience in environmental toxins and public health, water quality science, natural infrastructure, coastal resilience, hurricane and flood risk reduction, fisheries, and more.
Texas A&M University’s team of researchers provided substantial cross-disciplinary experience from their College of Veterinary Medicine and Biomedical Sciences, College of Engineering, School of Public Health and College of Architecture.
Galveston Bay Foundation’s team of local experts facilitated the creation of valuable connections in the Houston-Galveston Area, assisted with public engagement, and provided guidance and technical support for the Create NBS Decision Tool.
Alex Adame is a data analyst at the Environmental Defense Fund. Alex has a B.S. from Texas State University, where his passion for environmental science began while working in a summer research program. He is experienced in working with air quality data, especially in his home state of Texas, and strives to help historically disenfranchised communities.
Weihsueh A. Chiu, Ph.D., is a professor in the Department of Veterinary Physiology and Pharmacology at Texas A&M University. Before joining the university in 2015, he worked at the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency for more than 14 years, most recently as Chief of the Toxicity Pathways Branch in the Office or Research and Development. His research spans the landscape of human health risk assessment, including toxicokinetics, physiologically-based pharmacokinetic modeling, dose-response assessment, characterizing uncertainty/variability, systematic review, meta-analysis, and environmental and climate justice, with particular interest in Bayesian, probabilistic, and other quantitative methods. He is author/co-author of over 150 peer-reviewed journal publications, many governmental and international agency reports, and several book chapters. Dr. Chiu received an AB in Physics from Harvard University, a MA and PhD in Physics from Princeton University, and a Certificate in Science, Technology, and Environmental Policy from the Princeton School of Public and International Affairs.
Elena Craft, Ph.D. is the President of the Health Effects Institute. She has over two decades of experience in expert scientific research and communication of science to inform important public health decisions. Prior to joining HEI, Elena was an Associate Vice President of the Environmental Defense Fund, where she built and led a multidisciplinary team of 20 experts producing science and using it to inform decisions to reduce environmental exposures and improve public health.
Shannon E. Cunniff, currently a consultant to the Environmental Defense Fund, has over 40 years’ experience at the intersection of environmental policy, water resources issues, chemical contamination and risk analysis and hazard mitigation. As EDF’s Director of Coastal Resilience she advanced knowledge and broader acceptance of nature-based solutions to facilitate flood damage reduction and climate change resilience.
Cloelle Danforth, Ph.D. is a Senior Staff Scientist at Health Effects Institute with expertise in environmental engineering whose research has focused on characterizing the chemical and toxicological characteristics of oil and gas wastewater. Prior to joining HEI, Cloelle was a Senior Scientist at the Environmental Defense Fund in the Climate and Health program, working to understand impacts to human health and the environment from chemicals, waste management and unintended releases, and to identify policy development and regulatory drivers for more protective guidance.
Sepp Haukebo is Senior Manager for Environmental Defense Fund’s Global Fisheries Initiatives and works with anglers and scientists to develop and implement long term solutions to recreational fisheries management. His objectives are to balance access the fishery with sustainability for generations to come. In addition to fishing recreationally for the last 25 years, Sepp has spent years performing fishery ecology research in the Gulf of Mexico. He also has experience managing educational grants, leading marine conservation education programs, and analyzing marine science policy.
James M. Kaihatu, Ph.D., is a professor in the Zachry Department of Civil & Environmental Engineering at Texas A&M University, where he has been since 2006, after a 12 year career at the Naval Research Laboratory. His present research is focused on modeling of hurricane surge and inland floods. He earned his B.S. from California State Polytechnic University; an M.S. from the University of California; and his Ph.D. from the University of Delaware, all in Civil Engineering.
Gioia Kennedy, MPA (they/them) is a Project Management Fellow at the Environmental Defense Fund for the Transform Petrochemical Initiative. They have a Master in Public Administration from the Robert F. Wagner School of Public Service at NYU where they studied public policy analysis.
Thomas McDonald, Ph.D., is a Regent’s Professor in the School of Public Health – Department of Environmental and Occupational Health at Texas A&M University, College Station, TX. I have a broad background in environmental health sciences, analytic chemistry, and toxicology. For over twenty years, I have led or participated in the investigation of chemical exposures and their impact on human health. These studies have focused on trace metals and organic contaminants in tissues, soils/sediments, and waters. He has published over 120 journal articles and 12 book chapters.
Galen D. Newman, Ph.D., is Professor and Department Head in the Department of Landscape Architecture and Urban Planning at Texas A&M University. Dr. Newman’s research overlaps the fields of community resilience, land use science, urban analytics, landscape performance, and advanced visualization. He has published over 100 peer reviewed journals articles, two books, and has been a part of over 60 million dollars in interdisciplinary funded research projects.
Lauren Padilla, Ph.D., (Project Director) is the VoLo Senior Environmental Data Scientist at Environmental Defense Fund. Her interdisciplinary research at EDF combines large data, probability analysis and modeling to understand localized patterns of pollution, its root causes, and solutions. Dr. Padilla’s areas of expertise include environmental systems modeling, chemical fate and transport, exposure assessment, and data science. She has over a decade of experience in environmental data analysis in collaboration with academic, industry, government, and non-profit organizations. Dr. Padilla earned her B.E. at Dartmouth College and Ph.D. at Princeton University in the Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering Department, co-advised in the Atmospheric and Oceanic Sciences Program.
Rachel Rhode is a Manager for Environmental Defense Fund’s Climate Resilient Coasts and Watersheds strategic initiative. Rachel works to build resilience for coastal communities facing unprecedented threats from climate change. She seeks opportunities for innovation and collaboration that engage communities from the ground up and governments from the top down by using science-based solutions. Committed to developing and implementing locally-supported solutions, Rachel aims to help vulnerable communities bounce forward — rather than back — from disasters and other climate change impacts.
Garett Thomas Sansom, Ph.D.,, a Texas A&M Environmental & Occupational Health Assistant Professor and NIH-P42 investigator, has a decade of experience in environmental and public health assessment. His impactful work on environmental conditions and health implications earned him an early career fellowship with the National Academies of Science, Engineering, and Medicine.
Lisa Scobel, M.S., has a Master of Science in Environmental Conservation and is currently part of Galveston Bay Foundation’s Water Conservation team. Lisa’s experience includes facilitating citizen science initiatives and outreach events to engage the community around Galveston Bay, as well as coordinating with scientists and partners on the Galveston Bay Report Card.
Allyn West, M.F.A., Ph.D. (they/them), is Senior Communications Manager for Climate and Health at Environmental Defense Fund and oversees One Breath Partnership, a media collaboration among six nonprofits focused on community-based storytelling. Before joining EDF in 2019, they worked in the newsroom and served on the editorial board of the Houston Chronicle. Their writing has appeared in the Architect’s Newspaper, Oxford American, Texas Observer and elsewhere.
