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Author: David Kyler

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Development on Jekyll Island succumbing to shoreline erosion.

(Center Founder and Co-Director, David Kyler, prepared the following statement for a public hearing convened on December 14 regarding the Jekyll Island Authority's (JIA) Master Plan Update. The JIA commissioned a Capacity and Infrastructure Assessment published in 2018 which concluded Jekyll will reach its functional capacity by 2021 - Now! Yet the Draft Master Plan Update (MPU) under consideration avoids directly confronting the issues of overcrowding and overdevelopment and promotes commercial or residential redevelopment of land that is currently used for recreational purposes. We have joined the Initiative to Protect Jekyll Island and 100 Miles in asking the Legislative Oversight Committee to reject the MPU and place a moratorium on development until a detailed, forward-looking Capacity Plan is adopted by the JIA Board.)

Fifty years ago, in the early years of the worldwide environmental movement, the landmark book, Limits to Growth, became central in shaping my core values as a graduate student in environmental planning and policy.

Limits to Growth used innovative computer modeling to predict, with impressive accuracy, some of the most troubling predicaments we’re now facing, as massive human activities damage the world’s natural systems and threaten Earth’s habitability.

I encountered the challenge of environmental limits throughout my life’s work, first in two decades as a regional planner at what is now Georgia’s Coastal Regional Commission, and subsequently over the last 24 years working as an environmental advocate at the Center for a Sustainable Coast.

Limits are particularly significant on a barrier island such as Jekyll, where geographic boundaries impose absolute constraints, limits now being further restricted by rising sea-level caused by climate change.

On the regional planning staff, to control and mitigate growth we commonly advised local governments in zoning methods used to manage development, practices that are conspicuously lacking on Jekyll Island.

What is especially troubling on Jekyll is the absence of accountable controls that prevent threats to the health and sustainability of treasured natural resources that are fundamental to quality of life, and thus the unique value of the island as a state park.

Attempts to protect environmental quality by limiting the portion of land eligible for development have been defeated by the changing use of those developed areas, leading to escalating density – including higher and larger buildings that blatantly conflict with the tranquility for which Jekyll is renowned.

To serve the legislative charter establishing Jekyll Island State Park and honor obligations to the public, the JIA must adopt specific limits on development, which can be – and will be – legally enforced. Without these limits, the master plan update fails to achieve its fundamental purpose.

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Wetlands marked for destruction to make room for Frederica Road realignment.

In issuing permits for projects that disturb or alter the Waters of the United States, the Army Corps of Engineers plays a key role in protecting the nation's water under the federal Clean Water Act.

But the Corps repeatedly fails to fulfill its legal obligations to enforce regulations.

The Clean Water Act's [CWA] purpose is to restore the waters of the country – rivers, streams, and – to a lesser extent – wetlands. Defining those waters subject to regulations known by the term "Waters of the United States" (WOTUS) has been controversial. Due to the water-quality benefits of wetlands, there's been growing support for expanding the WOTUS definition to include more wetlands than previously recognized under the law. Under the CWA, the Corps regulates the disturbance and filling of wetlands that are defined under WOTUS.

Unfortunately, agricultural and land development interests have reinvigorated and funded resistance to expanding the regulated area under the CWA. In some cases and in some districts, this political resistance appears to be influencing both Corps permitting and subsequent court decisions, weakening protections of vital public resources and quality of life.

Certain kinds of projects are eligible for permits that are less thorough than requirements for others. For instance, government-funded road projects are eligible for a "regional general permit' [RGP] that can be issued without public review or environmental assessment. Likewise, individual docks that serve a single residential lot are eligible for a "programmatic general permit" [PGP], if they are not located within, or too close to, historic districts, national parks, or other features having special public purposes. A recurring problem is the Corps' failure to conform to the eligibility requirements for these RGPs and PGPs. This inappropriate issuance of special expedited permits removes safeguards provided by regular permitting, such as a public hearing and environmental review.

...continue reading "A Troubling Pattern Of Faulty Regulation On Georgia’s Coast & Beyond"

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On June 17, the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) released its Final Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) recommending the issuance of a rocket launch site operator’s license to Camden County. The last step in the process is for the FAA to release a Record of Decision (ROD) expected sometime this month. The Center sent the following letter condemning fundamental flaws in the environmental review that the FAA should correct by conducting a Supplemental EIS before making a decision. You can read the entire EIS online at the FAA's website.

Antares rocket failure October 28, 2014.

General Wayne Monteith, FAA Administrator

Associate Administrator FAA/AST

800 Independence Avenue SW

Washington, DC 20591

General Monteith:

I am writing to restate and expand upon concerns previously conveyed in our comments, and others, expressing well-justified alarm about glaring deficiencies in FAA’s review of Spaceport Camden.

For the sake of brevity, in these comments, I will limit remarks to four prominent areas of factual negligence and faulty assumptions related to the EIS that are both careless and misleading.

1.       Launch trajectory and hypothetical rocket characteristics – According to the most qualified opinions available, the launch trajectory proposed is implausible if not impossible to deliver payload in achieving a viable orbital mission. It appears that the manipulated launch-angle used in the EIS, and consequentially applied in the state’s consistency review, was improperly assumed for the convenience of attempting to reduce the hazard-zone for a launch failure during the initial stages immediately after launch. The misguided nature of this proposal is revealed by the absence of any precedent for small rockets using such an angle of trajectory to support the attainment of an orbital mission. Please clarify if and when such a small-rocket orbital launch has ever been done successfully, or if the notion is just theoretical conjecture.

Regarding the small size of the hypothetical rocket, why does the EIS describe storage at the site for what amounts to some 28 years of small-rocket fuel supply? This strongly suggests the hidden intention to transition to the use of larger rockets that require far more fuel, once licensing is obtained for a site approved based on a fantasized small rocket allegedly having smaller risks.

...continue reading "Letter to FAA Outlining Defects in Review of Spaceport Camden"

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In observance of Independence Day, we are posting this letter to the editor by Center Co-Director, David Kyler. It was originally published in the Savannah Morning News in July 2020.

Photo by Fabian Fauth on Unsplash

In the barrage of recent events, Independence Day invites self-reflection on the history and values associated with this hallowed holiday.

Diverse expressions of dissent related to COVID-19, racial issues, and national interest have exposed contentious rifts in America’s identity. Ironically, these conflicting viewpoints are commonly derived from aspirations embedded in the nation’s origins – foremost, individual liberty and the pursuit of happiness.

Americans are renowned for independent thinking, articulated in the landmark 1841 essay by Ralph Waldo Emerson, "Self-Reliance.” Resisting conformity and following one’s instincts as perceived in an “every-man-for-himself” world have been espoused for much of our history.

Related residual views still predominate among various divisive groups, serving as a vaguely understood basis of self-respect. Yet, intertwined social, economic, and technological changes that have occurred since these tenets of American identity were formulated require that we adapt them to new circumstances.

Personal liberty in the 21st century depends on a respectful society that requires tempering the excesses of a “frontier ethic” whose practitioners are often skeptical of science and hostile toward others – including racial minorities and migrants.

Abandoning fantasized freedoms is essential if we hope to restrain COVID and other diseases, restore our ravaged global environment, and establish lasting social justice.

Achieving an equitable, interdependent society with mutually beneficial opportunities requires that past prejudices and antagonisms be cast aside. A revitalized sense of the common good must inspire our vision.

To honor America’s ideals, we must struggle for independence from the oppressive dogmatism that degrades our country’s worthy prospects.

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Various planning updates are underway on Georgia's coast: the comprehensive plans for Chatham County and its cities, the Coastal Regional Plan, and the Jekyll Island Master Plan. Coastal plans must address the increasingly urgent causes and consequences of climate change to achieve community and regional planning benefits in making critical decisions that influence our future.

Over the past five years, climate disruption's dangerous impacts and causes have stirred well-founded public awareness and concern. Our rapidly growing understanding of the scale and significance of the causes of climate change and their grave consequences will be renowned as the fundamental "paradigm shift" of the 21st century.

Surveys consistently conclude that a majority now recognize that human activities are causing worldwide environmental degradation, which is of such urgency and magnitude that we must soon bring them under control or irreversibly impair the planet's life-support systems. Yet, until now, decades after these perils were well-known within the global scientific community, the plans of coastal Georgia's cities and counties have made little or no mention of climate change.

The only references to climate disruption in Georgia's coastal plans have concerned the rising sea level. These were limited to reactive adaptation, such as flood-control projects and flood-risk rating compliance. They were also all based on historical events, rather than the escalating science-based projections linked to global heating.

The current planning updates for coastal communities must acknowledge the urgency and acceleration of these hazards.

Moreover, planning must prioritize actions that reduce the cause of these accumulating hazards – namely, the emission of greenhouse gases – and protection of critical areas, both developed and natural, to the greatest extent possible. The alarming fact that some 43 percent of coastal Georgia residences are within the 100-year flood plain substantiates concern about escalating flooding.

Overdue recognition of climate-change impacts and causes in local and regional plans will have a critical advantage in an array of decision-making.

Furthermore, incorporating these considerations in planning documents, better positions our region in competition for imminent federal funding to support climate-related projects. Examples include flood-control infrastructure, clean-energy implementation, and power-transmission grid upgrades.

...continue reading "Timely advice to the planning authorities in coastal Georgia"

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Many have observed the depletion of credibility in daily discourse – causing a disturbing decline in fact-based consensus.

Without a fundamental sense of shared reality, how can we collectively – as a community, state, or nation – anticipate and respond to imminent threats and opportunities?

Perplexity about this predicament was renewed when I recently learned of terminology – accepted by a federal court – for describing a rocket explosion as a “rapid unscheduled disassembly.”  This devious euphemism for an event threatening death and destruction epitomizes the abuse of language that accelerates an alarming abandonment of truth.

The impoverishment of facts that afflicts our political institutions has brought us to the brink of environmental destruction. Consider that science has verified the human causes of climate change for more than two decades. Yet, many elected officials still thwart actions to confront them, thereby propagating the serious consequences of rising temperatures. 

...continue reading "Earth Day Must Become Truth Day"

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March 8 was the deadline for Georgians to comment on a justifiably controversial project proposed in Camden County, known as "Spaceport Camden." If approved, this spaceport would be the only such facility in the U.S. ever sanctioned to launch rockets over privately owned and occupied property. Moreover, the "hazard zone" for launching includes the world-renowned Cumberland Island National Seashore, part of which is a federally designated Wilderness Area.

Since 1997, under the federal Coastal Zone Management Act, Georgia's Department of Natural Resources (DNR) has been authorized to review major federal permits to determine if they are consistent with Georgia's Coastal Management Program. DNR's Coastal Resources Division (CRD) is currently engaged in evaluating Spaceport Camden.

Accordingly, CRD invited public comments on the agency's proposal to issue Coastal Consistency Certification. If certified by CRD/DNR, the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), which administers spaceports under U.S. law, would have to decide whether to license Spaceport Camden. Most agree that without state certification, FAA would be less likely to grant the license. 

As objectionable as the project certainly is for jeopardizing humans, wildlife, valuable homesites, tourism destinations, and rare natural resources, there is a less apparent but closely related reason to oppose the spaceport - the appalling lack of detailed information to evaluate such risks responsibly. After years of unsubstantiated claims about the spaceport's benefits, compounded by incomplete, contradictory, and illogical review of the project, fundamental questions remain unanswered.

For instance:

...continue reading "Why DNR Should Give Spaceport Camden a Thumbs Down"