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Gustav, near landfall, could park over northeast Texas

NEW ORLEANS, Louisiana (CNN) — As Hurricane Gustav neared Louisiana’s coast Monday morning, forecasters warned that the storm could stall over Louisiana and northeast Texas for several days, which would exacerbate the threat of heavy rains and inland flooding.

Southern Louisiana’s barrier islands and coast reported hurricane force winds and heavy rains from Gustav, which was centered about 80 miles south of New Orleans and about 20 miles south-southeast of Port Fourchon, Louisiana, at 8 a.m. CT.

Power went out about 6 a.m. in the western part of downtown New Orleans and in the French Quarter 10 minutes later, CNN correspondents Chris Lawrence and Anderson Cooper reported.

The eye of Hurricane Gustav made landfall near Cocodrie, Louisiana, about 9:30 a.m. CT, the National Hurricane Center said.

Gustav’s top winds weakened to 110 mph, downgrading it to a Category 2 storm, the hurricane center said. Watch water overflow banks of Industrial Canal

Earlier predictions of a Category 4 storm, which would mean winds of at least 131 mph, and fresh memories of Katrina, which came ashore in 2005 with 127-mph winds, fueled the evacuation of 2 million residents from New Orleans and other parishes.

But Gustav never regained the strength lost over Cuba, and by Monday morning hurricane center forecasters said its cloud pattern looked a bit more ragged. Watch New Orleans man explain his sad reason for staying

The latest discussion published by the hurricane center forecasters said computer models show Gustav or its remnants slowing to a crawl over northeast Texas over the next three to five days.

Such slow motion would exacerbate the threat of heavy rains and inland flooding, the forecasters said. Watch water spill over canal levee

With hurricane-force winds extending 70 miles from the center, the islands and shoreline are already in reach of Gustav’s fury.

Sustained winds of 91 mph and gusts of 117 mph were measured in Southwest Pass, Louisiana, during the 4 a.m. hour, the hurricane center said.

CNN’s Ali Velshi was hunkered down in a house on Grand Isle, Louisiana, where only a handful of people remained.

found here.

Water clears levees as Gustav makes Louisiana landfall

PORT FOURCHON, Louisiana (CNN) — Hurricane-force winds slammed into oil terminals around Port Fourchon, southwest of New Orleans, as the eye of Category 2 Gustav was churning just off the Gulf shore Monday morning, according to radar.

The eye of Hurricane Gustav made landfall near Cocodrie, Louisiana, about 9:30 a.m. CT (10:30 a.m. ET), the National Hurricane Center said.

Winds were sending whitecaps over levees in New Orleans, but the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers reported no major problems.

There were reports of water going over a levee near a railroad bridge, said Chris Macaluso, a spokesman for the Louisiana Office of Coastal Protection and Restoration. The Port of New Orleans will raise the bridge to ease pressure on the system, he said. Watch water spill over the levee

According to forecasts, Gustav — which was downgraded to a Category 2 hurricane when its winds weakened to 110 mph (177 kph) Monday morning — is expected to skim New Orleans, which is still recovering from 2005’s Hurricane Katrina.

Port Fourchon, packed with oil terminals and distribution facilities, is the terminal for tankers bringing oil to the United States from overseas. The U.S. Department of Energy says 56 percent of the imported and Gulf of Mexico oil entering the United States passes this point.

The National Weather Service issued tornado warnings for parts of Louisiana, Mississippi, Florida and Alabama, and a tornado was spotted near the Stennis Space Center in Hancock County, Mississippi, near the Louisiana border. Watch gales batter home, reporter

Though there were no immediate reports of water inundating homes, Hancock County Emergency Management Director Brian Adam said several low-lying roads in southern Mississippi were seeing quite a bit of flooding.

Hancock County is where Katrina made its final landfall three years ago.

From just outside New Orleans, in Harahan, Louisiana, Megan Arseneaux, 19, said in an e-mail that phone service was spotty at her East Bank home, two blocks from the Mississippi River.

My backyard is full of leaves and debris. The wind was very intense when I woke up around 6 a.m., she said. As I type this, the wind has actually picked up. The rain is very harsh too.

Arseneaux said she and her mother stayed in Jefferson Parish because they could not decide whether to flee Gustav, given that the highways were clogged with evacuees this weekend. They decided to stay at their home, which has boards on the front windows and sandbags along the front door, she said. Watch wind, rain batter Jefferson Parish

There are concerns that if Gustav moves up the Mississippi River’s estuaries, some levees may not hold, resulting in severe flooding. Although many levees have been repaired and heightened since Katrina struck in 2005, all of the work won’t be completed until 2011, officials said.

The U.S. Geological Survey said Gustav has already caused an almost 9-foot storm surge in Pointe a La Hache, Louisiana, about 40 miles southeast of New Orleans. Another 1 to 3 feet of surge could occur, the USGS said.

Forecasters warned that a surge of 10 to 14 feet would cause life-threatening flooding. Pointe a La Hache is a mere 3 feet above sea level.

Entergy power said in a statement on its Web site that more than a quarter-million customers in Louisiana were without power as of 8:30 a.m. CT. iReport.com: Did you stay? Share your story

Around 8 a.m., Children’s Hospital lost power and switched to generators. A short while later, East Jefferson General Hospital lost power and was running on generators.

Children’s Hospital has refused to evacuate all of its patients because some of them — including a 4-year-old boy named Cameron who was recovering from heart surgery — wouldn’t survive a move, hospital spokesman Brian Landry said.

More than half its 80 young patients are in critical condition, and parents were allowed to stay with them, he said. The hospital has enough food and water for three weeks, he said.

Grand Isle, which is in the middle of Gustav’s path, was covered in water, and lights were extinguished in parts of downtown New Orleans, including the French Quarter. Only a handful of people remained in Grand Isle, a town of about 1,500.

When high winds first kicked up about 3:15 a.m. (4:15 a.m. ET) Monday, the barrier island’s electric power went out. A storm surge of at least 14 feet is expected there, according to forecasters.

The levee on the beach seems to be holding up, said Grand Isle Fire Captain Deacon Guidry. The water is just starting to rise from the bay side. Watch residents leaving

Guidry completed an inspection tour of the island just before dawn. He said he saw sheet metal from roofs on the road and power lines down, even before Gustav’s powerful winds had reached the island.

Guidry, who is staying with others from the island in a reinforced house, said the flooding pattern is similar to that of Katrina, with the storm surge washing over from the backside of the island. At 5:30 a.m. (6:30 a.m. ET), floodwaters surrounded the house, cutting off all exits from the island.

The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers closed flood gates on the Harvey Canal on the west bank of the Mississippi River on Monday. The step, not unexpected, is the first significant measure to prevent flooding in parts of Jefferson Parish that did not flood during Katrina.

Forecasters said Gustav could drench parts of Louisiana, Mississippi, Arkansas and Texas in 6 to 12 inches of rain, with the possibility of up to 20 inches in isolated areas by Thursday.

Property damage from Gustav could total $8 billion, just 25 percent of Sunday’s estimate, according to a federally supported computer projection issued Monday morning. Sunday’s estimate of $32.8 billion in property damage was based on winds of 126 mph.

The projection now says about 78,036 buildings will be moderately damaged and 13,286 buildings destroyed. It estimates Gustav will leave behind 13 million tons of debris, less than half of Sunday’s projection. See damage map

Forecasters warned Monday morning Gustav could stall over Louisiana and northeast Texas for several days, which would exacerbate the threat of heavy rains and inland flooding.

found here.

Hurricane Gustav begins to pound Louisiana

(CNN) — Hurricane Gustav began to lash the southern Louisiana coastline early Monday as it moved closer to an expected midday landfall, according to the National Hurricane Center in Miami, Florida.

As the storm closed in, power went out around 6 a.m. in the western part of downtown New Orleans, and lights also went out in the French Quarter at about 10 minutes later.

CNN’s Ali Velshi was hunkered down in a house on Grand Isle, Louisiana, south of New Orleans, where only a handful of people remained.

When high winds first kicked up about 3:15 a.m. (4:15 a.m. ET) Monday, the barrier island’s electric power went out, Velshi said. A storm surge of at least 14 feet is expected there, he said.

The levee on the beach seems to be holding up, said Grand Isle Fire Captain Deacon Guidry. The water is just starting to rise from the bay side.

Guidry completed an inspection tour of the island just before dawn. He said that he saw sheet metal from roofs on the road and power lines down, even before Gustav’s powerful winds had reached the island.

Guidry, who is staying with others from the island in a reinforced house, said the flooding pattern is similar to that of Hurricane Katrina in 2005, with the storm surge washing over from the backside of the island. At 5:30 a.m. CT, floodwaters surrounded the house, cutting off all exits from the island.

Forecasters warned Monday morning Gustav could stall over Louisiana and northeast Texas for several days, which would exacerbate the threat of heavy rains and inland flooding.

With hurricane-force winds extending 70 miles (113 kilometers) from the center, the islands and shoreline were already feeling the reach of Gustav’s fury.

Sustained winds of 91 mph (146 kph) and gusts of 117 mph (188 kph) were measured in Southwest Pass, Louisiana, around 4 a.m., the hurricane center said.

The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers closed flood gates on the Harvey Canal on the west bank of the Mississippi River on Monday. The step, not unexpected, is the first significant measure to prevent flooding of parts of Jefferson Parish that did not flood during Katrina.

Property damage from Gustav could total $8 billion, just 25 percent of Sunday’s estimate, according to a federally supported computer projection issued Monday morning. Sunday’s estimate of $32.8 billion in property damage was based on winds of 126 mph.

The projection now says about 78,036 buildings will be moderately damaged and 13,286 buildings destroyed. It estimates Gustav will leave behind 13 million tons of debris, less than half of Sunday’s projection.

Nearly all of the roughly 2 million people in coastal Louisiana and the New Orleans area had cleared out ahead of Gustav on Sunday night.

Gustav’s center was about 85 miles (137 kilometers) south of New Orleans and about 20 miles south-southeast of Port Fourchon, Louisiana, at 6 a.m. (7 a.m. ET), the hurricane center said.

Gustav was moving northwest at about 16 mph (26 kph), headed for an expected landfall on Louisiana’s coast southwest of New Orleans around midday, the hurricane center said.

Gustav’s winds make it a dangerous Category 3 storm, but no more strengthening was expected before landfall, the hurricane center said.

Road, rail and air links out of New Orleans began to close as the first storm bands began to strike the city. But fewer than 10,000 people were thought to remain in New Orleans, Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal said, citing the city’s police chief.

New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin had demanded an evacuation of the city, which still is recovering from Katrina.

Jindal said New Orleans’ levees should barely hold or barely be overtopped if the storm, as predicted Sunday evening, hit southwest of the city.

But even a slight shift to the east could bring very significant flooding in these areas, he said. iReport.com: Did you stay? Share your story

A leading researcher said the hurricane probably would test New Orleans’ western levees, which, unlike levees in other parts of the city, didn’t receive the brunt of Katrina’s force in 2005. The western levees are low in some sections, he said.

From the west bank of New Orleans all the way across to Morgan City … we’re going to see communities potentially go under water from levee overtopping and potential breaching, said Louisiana State University professor Ivor van Heerden, who warned long before Katrina that a major hurricane would be catastrophic for New Orleans. Watch residents leaving

Hurricane-force winds could hit Louisiana’s southern coast by sunrise Monday, and the storm’s center could hit southwest of New Orleans by early Monday afternoon, CNN meteorologists said.

Storm surges of 10 to 14 feet above normal tides are expected near and to the east of Gustav’s center, forecasters said. Rain accumulations of 6 to 12 inches are possible over parts of Louisiana, Mississippi and Arkansas, with isolated amounts of up to 20 inches, through Wednesday morning, according to forecasters.

Gustav killed at least 51 people in southwestern Haiti and eight in the neighboring Dominican Republic last week before moving to Cuba, which said it evacuated 250,000 people from the storm’s path. No storm-related deaths in Cuba were immediately reported; a Cuban official said many people were injured on Cuba’s Isle of Youth. Watch residents talk about damage in Cuba

In New Orleans, Lt. Col. Jerry Sneed, the city’s emergency operations chief, said government agencies had evacuated 18,000 residents who were without transportation.

Jindal said the New Orleans area had finished evacuating homebound and nursing home patients by 7 p.m. ET Sunday, and 73 critical care patients deemed safe to move still were in the process of being moved out of the area. Watch why one New Orleans man refuses to leave

Some critical care patients had to stay at medical facilities. Eighty patients remained Sunday evening at New Orleans Children’s Hospital, more than half of them in a critical care unit.

Highways out of town were packed all day Sunday with evacuees from Louisiana and Mississippi.

It was bumper-to-bumper for about 10 hours trying to get out, said Roberto Ascencio of the New Orleans suburb of Gretna.

Charter flights, paid for with federal funds, carried thousands of evacuees to other Southern cities. The air evacuation was part of a detailed plan developed in response to criticism after Katrina, a Category 3 storm, flooded most of New Orleans, flattened beach towns in Mississippi and killed more than 1,800 people.

Nagin said New Orleans would impose a dusk-to-dawn curfew for anyone left. Watch Nagin voice concern about storm’s potential effect on the city

The city-wide curfew will continue until the threat of the storm passes, Nagin said, warning that looters would be dealt with harshly. Watch Nagin warn would-be looters

Anybody who’s caught looting in the city of New Orleans will go directly to Angola [Louisiana State Penitentiary]. You will not have a temporary stay in the city. You go directly to the big house, in general population, he said.

The storm altered plans for the Republican National Convention, which is scheduled to run from Monday through Thursday in Minnesota.

Rick Davis, campaign manager Sen. John McCain, the presumptive GOP presidential nominee, said Monday’s session would run only from 3 to 5:30 p.m. CT, and will include only activities necessary to launch the event. Watch report on Republicans’ altered plans

Convention plans for the rest of the week will be made as the storm is assessed, he said.

Earlier Sunday, President Bush said he would forgo an appearance at the convention to meet with emergency workers and evacuees in Texas.

Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour said government agencies were 10 times better prepared than before — but that doesn’t mean everything is going to go right, he said.

found here.

Lighting the way to affordable solar power

CNN — It has been said before that environmental-friendliness is a luxury few can really afford.

For the three billion people living on less than $2 a day, the idea of finding enough money to install solar power in their homes would seem a fanciful one, particularly when around two billion people lack access to electricity in the first place.

But there are those that now say that solar power is no longer be a pipe dream for people in the poorest parts of the world.

One of those people is Nicole Kuepper. Kuepper has just won a top science award in her native Australia for an eco-invention specifically designed to benefit those living in the developing world.

She has managed to find a way to manufacture solar cells with the help of an inkjet printer, some nail varnish remover-like substance and a pizza oven.

The result is a solar product called iJET which Kuepper says should slash the costs of making solar panels in half by taking expensive clean-room style production facilities and high labor costs out of the equation.

I was interested in ways to simplify the process, the University of New South Wales PhD student and lecturer explains. We figured if we made the manufacturing [process] easier to understand, it could work in developing countries.

And getting locals interested in solar won’t be a difficult sell, she believes.

In a lot of these rural environments, people are spending a lot of their money on energy anyway. So in developing countries, it is actually a lot more cost competitive. Photovoltaics (PV) are already directly competing with what they are spending money on, says Kuepper.

Jeremy Leggett founder of UK solar energy provider, Solar Century says any new ideas are welcome, but is confident the course to cheap solar power has been charted anyway.

There is a revolution under way with existing technology, which includes crystalline silicon and thin film, so anything else, any technological breakthroughs are going to be massive icing on the cake, says Leggett.

And in the developing world, what other choice is there? Many households in the developing world can afford it now because it is cheaper than what it is competing with, particularly kerosene. Really poor people will save money with solar.

Community efforts and micro-finance lead the way

Solar solutions for the poor won’t necessarily come from any kind of overhaul of the national grid but from their own efforts, Leggett believes.

In the developing world the grid doesn’t even work and it is massively expensive to extend the grid. And the challenge is also getting distribution in place.

Getting people installing solar themselves on a house by house and community by community basis is the way forward, he suggests.

His charity Solar Aid has been doing that in Malawi, Tanzania and Zambia recently to convert local inhabitants’ kerosene lanterns into light-emitting diode (LED) solar ones. He calls it the easiest sell in the world.

You can take an existing kerosene lantern and for a very short payback you can buy a solar panel, a couple of batteries and LED’s and convert the lamp, he says.

People are quite capable of doing this stuff.

People might be capable, but the question of money will always remain. For Leggett, however, the answer to pervading money issues in the poorest parts of the world is straightforward enough: micro-finance.

I think the most important thing is the widespread availability of micro-credit, argues Leggett reasoning: The default rates for micro loans are really, really low.

Kuepper may be hoping a micro-loan will allow some of the poorest people to take advantage of her invention once it is available in the marketplace.

But she hopes it will be easily accessible to the poorest people anyway. Her idea is not just to bring solar provision to developing world households, but to take the industry there too.

If local entrepreneurs were able to make solar cells themselves for their own local markets then jobs would be created locally. The cost savings associated with local manufacturing would get passed down to the consumer.

Manufacturing is definitely not commonplace in the least developed countries, like Laos, for example, she says. That would be my endgame.

found here.

Lighting the way to affordable solar power

CNN — It has been said before that environmental-friendliness is a luxury few can really afford.

For the three billion people living on less than $2 a day, the idea of finding enough money to install solar power in their homes would seem a fanciful one, particularly when around two billion people lack access to electricity in the first place.

But there are those that now say that solar power is no longer be a pipe dream for people in the poorest parts of the world.

One of those people is Nicole Kuepper. Kuepper has just won a top science award in her native Australia for an eco-invention specifically designed to benefit those living in the developing world.

She has managed to find a way to manufacture solar cells with the help of an inkjet printer, some nail varnish remover-like substance and a pizza oven.

The result is a solar product called iJET which Kuepper says should slash the costs of making solar panels in half by taking expensive clean-room style production facilities and high labor costs out of the equation.

I was interested in ways to simplify the process, the University of New South Wales PhD student and lecturer explains. We figured if we made the manufacturing [process] easier to understand, it could work in developing countries.

And getting locals interested in solar won’t be a difficult sell, she believes.

In a lot of these rural environments, people are spending a lot of their money on energy anyway. So in developing countries, it is actually a lot more cost competitive. Photovoltaics (PV) are already directly competing with what they are spending money on, says Kuepper.

Jeremy Leggett founder of UK solar energy provider, Solar Century says any new ideas are welcome, but is confident the course to cheap solar power has been charted anyway.

There is a revolution under way with existing technology, which includes crystalline silicon and thin film, so anything else, any technological breakthroughs are going to be massive icing on the cake, says Leggett.

And in the developing world, what other choice is there? Many households in the developing world can afford it now because it is cheaper than what it is competing with, particularly kerosene. Really poor people will save money with solar.

Community efforts and micro-finance lead the way

Solar solutions for the poor won’t necessarily come from any kind of overhaul of the national grid but from their own efforts, Leggett believes.

In the developing world the grid doesn’t even work and it is massively expensive to extend the grid. And the challenge is also getting distribution in place.

Getting people installing solar themselves on a house by house and community by community basis is the way forward, he suggests.

His charity Solar Aid has been doing that in Malawi, Tanzania and Zambia recently to convert local inhabitants’ kerosene lanterns into light-emitting diode (LED) solar ones. He calls it the easiest sell in the world.

You can take an existing kerosene lantern and for a very short payback you can buy a solar panel, a couple of batteries and LED’s and convert the lamp, he says.

People are quite capable of doing this stuff.

People might be capable, but the question of money will always remain. For Leggett, however, the answer to pervading money issues in the poorest parts of the world is straightforward enough: micro-finance.

I think the most important thing is the widespread availability of micro-credit, argues Leggett reasoning: The default rates for micro loans are really, really low.

Kuepper may be hoping a micro-loan will allow some of the poorest people to take advantage of her invention once it is available in the marketplace.

But she hopes it will be easily accessible to the poorest people anyway. Her idea is not just to bring solar provision to developing world households, but to take the industry there too.

If local entrepreneurs were able to make solar cells themselves for their own local markets then jobs would be created locally. The cost savings associated with local manufacturing would get passed down to the consumer.

Manufacturing is definitely not commonplace in the least developed countries, like Laos, for example, she says. That would be my endgame.

found here.