While the Army Corps of Engineers and municipal water systems prepare for the encroaching seawater working its way up the Mississippi River bed, local leaders are concerned about how effects on the supply of fresh drinking water could affect business and industry.
New Orleans City Councilman J.P. Morrell says there is more to it than just drinking water.
"Almost all industrial facilities, including most hotels and restaurants, use tap water-fueled chillers to chill their water and provide air conditioning for their buildings," Morrell told WWL's Tommy Tucker.
Morrell says that equipment is too expensive for businesses to risk losing to corrosion, and many hotels would just close and wait for the crisis to pass.
"If you work in the service industry, in a hotel, let's say for example, and that hotel, to survive and save its equipment, can't operate for a month, that's a month of no income," said Morrell.
He says that is why federal help is going to be needed. Louisiana Governor John Bel Edwards has requested a federal emergency declaration.
