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Bay Fill for Habitat Restoration, Enhancement, and Creation in a Changing Bay

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Bay Fill for Habitat Restoration, Enhancement, and Creation in a Changing Bay STAFF REPORT Bay Fill for Habitat Restoration, Enhancement, and Creation in a Changing Bay May 24, 2019 SAN FRANCISCO BAY CONSERVATION AND DEVELOPMENT COMMISSION 455 Golden Gate Avenue, Suite 10600 San Francisco, CA 94102 Information: (415) 352-3600 Fax: (415) 352-3606 Web site: BCDC Website Table of Contents 1. Executive Summary .................................................................................. 4 2. The Changing Bay ...................................................................................... 4 Climate Change and Sea Level Rise. ....................................................... 4 Threatened Bay Ecosystems ....................................................................... 5 Decreasing Sediment Supply ...................................................................... 6 Fragmented Wetland Ecosystems .............................................................. 7 Mitigating Change ....................................................................................... 7 3. Forty Years of Habitat Restoration in the Bay ............................................. 8 Long Term Management Strategy (LTMS) Goals .................................... 9 4. Challenges for Restoration Implementation.............................................. 13 5. “Bay Fill” and BCDC’s Associated Policies .................................................. 15 Justifiable Filling ....................................................................................... 16 Effects of Bay Filling .................................................................................. 16 6. Fill for Habitat in a Changing Bay .............................................................. 21 A. Habitat-Specific Challenges and the Need for Fill ................................ 21 Subtidal Areas .......................................................................................... 21 Beaches .................................................................................................... 25 Tidal Marshes and Tidal Flats ................................................................... 26 Transition Zones ....................................................................................... 30 B. A Landscape Scale Approach ................................................................... 32 C. Economic Benefits of Habitat Restoration ........................................... 37 Shoreline Protection, Shoreline Stabilization, and Flood Control ........... 39 Carbon Sequestration .............................................................................. 40 Water Quality Improvement .................................................................... 41 Commercial Fishing .................................................................................. 41 Recreation ................................................................................................ 43 Job Creation ............................................................................................. 43 7. Impacts and Tradeoffs .............................................................................. 44 A. BCDC Laws and Policies: Conservation, Protection, Avoidance, and Minimization of Impacts .................................................................... 44 B. Impacts of Fill Placement ................................................................... 47 Water Column Communities .................................................................... 48 Benthic Subtidal Communities ................................................................. 49 Mudflat Communities .............................................................................. 51 2 Marsh Communities ................................................................................. 53 Minimizing Fill for Habitat Impacts .......................................................... 54 C. Habitat Type Conversion and Habitat Tradeoffs ................................. 55 D. What is the Alternative? .................................................................... 59 8. Moving Forward with Uncertainty ........................................................... 61 A. Design ............................................................................................... 61 B. Monitoring ........................................................................................ 65 C. Adaptive Management ...................................................................... 69 D. Pilot and Demonstration Projects ...................................................... 73 9. Next Steps and Complementary Efforts ................................................... 74 A. Future BCDC Actions .......................................................................... 75 B. External Improvements to Restoration Project Permitting...................77 3 1. Executive Summary Sea level rise presents an unprecedented threat to Bay Area ecosystems. Sea level rise projections for the state of California indicate that valuable habitats, including tidal marshes, mudflats, and upland transition zones will experience more frequent inundation and rising average water levels. Subtidal habitats such as oyster and eelgrass beds will be exposed to deeper waters that could threaten their survival. To restore these ecosystems to their natural state or raise their elevation to make them more resilient to sea level rise, placement of potentially large volumes of Bay fill may be necessary. BCDC’s San Francisco Bay Plan (Bay Plan) policies currently restrict the amount of fill or dredged sediment that can be used for habitat projects in the Bay to a “minor” amount. These policies add restrictions to habitat projects beyond what is required for all projects proposing fill under the McAteer-Petris Act—that “the fill should be the minimum necessary to achieve the purpose of the fill…” The “minor fill” policies found in the Bay Plan could become problematic in the near future as more innovative and large-scale habitat restoration measures are proposed. Techniques such as constructing horizontal levees (a levee with a broad, shallow slope connecting to lower habitats, providing flood protection and habitat features), sediment augmentation to the marsh plain, marsh and subtidal habitat creation, among others, will be important sea level rise adaptation measures for Bay habitats, but may not be permissible to the extent necessary under current policies. Staff proposes that the “minor amount of fill” language should be removed from Bay Plan policies, but will still be subject to the McAteer- Petris Act fill requirements, thus ensuring that projects will not use excessive amounts of fill and must justify the fill volume that they are using is necessary. However, allowing more fill in the Bay for habitat projects could result in some impacts and habitat type conversions, such as marsh to upland or mudflat to marsh, the consequences of which are difficult to predict. To address uncertainties regarding project design and potential project impacts, staff recommends that detailed monitoring and adaptive management plans should be developed and carried out. This background report addresses the potential need to change BCDC’s natural resource policies regarding fill in habitat projects, and the associated scientific and policy considerations. Next steps and external efforts to improve restoration of habitat projects in the Bay Area are also described herein. 2. The Changing Bay Climate Change and Sea Level Rise In California, climate change has resulted in myriad environmental changes which are expected to intensify in the coming century, including rising temperatures, ocean acidification, more frequent storms, changes in precipitation, more wildfires, and rising sea level.1 In coastal areas, sea level rise is of particular concern as it threatens to permanently inundate priceless coastal ecosystems and billions of dollars of infrastructure. Sea level rise is caused by increasing releases of greenhouse gases that warm the planet, causing a combination of thermal 1 Louise Bedsworth et al., “Statewide Summary Report,” (California's Fourth Climate Change Assessment, December 21, 2018.) 4 expansion of seawater and melting land ice and polar ice sheets.2 This phenomenon presents a great threat to coastal ecosystems and human communities as more frequent flooding and inundation of the current coastline occurs, and contributes to increased erosion of both natural and hardened shorelines. While sea level rise is a global phenomenon, sea levels will continue to vary locally. The State of California has undertaken several efforts to understand how climate change and sea level rise will specifically affect its major regions. Key reports include Rising Seas in California,3 a document that synthesizes the state of the science on sea level rise, and the State of California Sea-Level Rise Guidance: 2018 Update.4 Both of these reports predict the most likely scenarios for sea level rise in the state and assess some of the effects that sea level rise is likely to have in California. They provide local projections and historical summaries of sea level rise for the twelve major active tide gauges along the California Coast, including the San Francisco Bay Area tide gauge. The evidence summarized in these reports suggests that sea level in the San Francisco Bay Area (Bay Area) has already risen eight inches in the last 100 years,5 and is likely to rise anywhere between 2.8 and 4.1 feet in the next century. Extreme ice melt scenarios suggest
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