Bioremediation in New Orleans

Disasters often provide opportunities to test new technologies 1. because things are so badly off that the government foregoes the usual hoops that otherwise would price out small cutting-edge operations, and 2. because any help is appreciated to address long-term problems. That said, disaster areas provide a real-world lab in which to experiment and easy to identify results measured against other traditional remedies that are concurrently taking place to deal with the same general problems. In the case of New Orleans, the problem is a toxic gumbo adding to an area already referred to as "cancer alley" (the lower Mississippi from Baton Rouge to New Orleans).


"Bioremediation" means cleaning soil and water and restoring it to health using beneficial bacteria, plants and fungi. Restoration on the scale of New Orleans is an overwhelming project, but many techniques are applicable on a small scale. One group has been working on a proposal to fund and train a worker's cooperative that would be able to put them into practice.