Mississippi flooding to affect national economy

(CBS News) 

The flooding on the Mississippi River is sure to cost billions of dollars in damage and lost business - and diverting flood waters away from New Orleans may not reduce the cost of this disaster by much.

But just how much will the flooding cost the southern flooded areas - and the rest of the U.S.?

CBS News business and economics correspondent Rebecca Jarvis said on "The Early Show" Tuesday that the area affected by flooding is very significant to the national economy because of its gasoline resources.

"Thirteen percent of the nation's energy sources (are) coming from this part of Louisiana," she said. "One in nine gallons of gasoline that we use in this country every day comes from this part of the country."

Ships, she added, also go through the area, from cargo to cruise ships.

The immediate risk to oil refineries and shipping, Jarvis said, seems to have been somewhat lessened by opening the spillways in the flood zones.

"That's why the decision was made," she said.

"Early Show" co-anchor Chris Wragge said that while major refineries and shipping areas are safe at this time, the surrounding farmland and homes in small towns may be under 20 feet of water for what some say could be weeks.

"We're looking at hundreds of millions of dollars' worth of damage to farmland. We're hearing from corn farmers in the area who have not been able to plant their seedlings," Jarvis said. "You could also see in this country, as a result of all of this, corn prices going higher."

[RetLAEnvEmployee]

Gasoline is only a small part of what is produced in south Louisiana. From oil, natural gas, salt, sulphur, wood chips, bauxite and other resources only found in this area -- the USA gets its supply of fertilizers, pesticides, herbicides, paint bases, chlorides, soaps, feed for livestock, plastics, rubber bases, fabrics, coatings, industrial chemical bases, solvents, medicines, asphalt for roads and shingle, and the list goes on and on and on...

South Louisiana and costal east Texas are the petroleum chemical centers of the United States. A Mississippi River running wild could fill Lake Erie with water in 100 days with the present flow/flood stages. If flooding were to occur on both sides (east and west) 13% gasoline production lost will be not be that important compared to 50% of the industrial base of the petroleum chemical industry and the three largest ports in the USA - 2,000,000 people would flood & losses would be in the 10's of billions with economic losses to the USA in the trillions.

[Pattie1964]

The waters from the Mississpi are a vast depository of econoy scale solutions for good. My question and my challenge to those that know about water, is how much of this resource is needed in the delta, the marshes, and the ocean. What could be siphoned off, and used to provide long term health and re-juvenation to the lands that provide this water. Given that water rights at the state level exist, the water needs to be divided out via some natural process and allowed to go back where it originated to continue the life processes where it properly belongs, months and years before the big glutts that we see occuring. I know it looks and seems bad, but it can only be natures challenge to man, to determine what it is needing to continue to thrive, and become a part of the lands natural management.

I have watched a documentary on Civil engineering about water shortages in Nevada. The engineers got the sewer water so clean it could be easy consumed. High time for technical types to work out something for our future. Sort of a contribution of a welcome kind from baby-boomers is long in the making, so I think we need to quickly gauge these kinds of advances and put them in place for the long term consuption of this nation, because it will be good for us. I know we can do it, so let us in on these kinds of plans. the very long term ones: 1-50 years, 50 - 100 years and up. Let's go with it.

[mb91764]

If obama farts it effects the economy.There's not a day that go by that something some where doesn't cause our economy to freak.When corn prices went crazy because of the greed,I quit using it.Gas,I cut back and will keep cutting back.We whine about prices but we want the govermment to do something,big mistake.We are smart so use your head and fight back at these price gouging scams.Oh yea, food prices,try growing your on food.

[slightlyagitated]

I reside in Pennsylvania. With the local manufacturing of Ethanol using a large portion of the corn crop, the price of corn has already been raised to the point where it is too high for many residents to raise livestock for personal consumption. Considering this combined with the flooding of the Delta's farmland, can anyone explain to me why there are still countless farmers receiving government subsidies NOT to grow and harvest corn???

[msimamaji]

Corn based ethanol is a lousy way to produce fuel. Algae is a much better fuel source, and algal oil can fit into our current infrastructre, since you can refine it to any way you want.
I might also add that corn does deplete the soil of nutrients. That's the reason for crop rotation and other sustainable farming practices. Remember an over reliance on corn was one of the reasons for the downfall of the Mayas.