SHELL
Team information
Category:
Hairuo Yi
Master
University College London
Titas Banerjee
Master
University College London
Lok Yu Hui
Master
University College of London
Maile Harris
Master
University College London
Mariam Hanan Hameed Sulaiman Lebbai
Master
University College London
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About the team
We are team SHELL and aim to Support a Healthy Environment for Lower Louisiana
Our vision
Our vision for a nature positive future is community based and oriented. As the urban center of the Mississippi Delta, New Orleans is a hub of culture and connectivity, its population living with the water for centuries. We aim to build upon this philosophy and bring back a self regenerative project for our vision - with a community center that provides shelter and engages the next generation. This floating space serves as a place of resilience during flooding and storms, focusing on regenerating local biodiversity and sustainable aquaculture to provide food. It also is accessible through major roads and canals to the people most at risk during various hazards and flooding, especially the communities with the highest populations in poverty. Utilizing a wetland restoration space, we aim to keep the community most vulnerable afloat as NOLA develops with the rising waters over the next century and hopefully for long to come.
Our inventory & analysis
The Mississippi River Delta has evolved over 7,000 years through the river’s flood pulse and delta-switching cycle, creating sediment-rich wetlands, diverse habitats, and fertile floodplains. However, levees, dams, oil and gas extraction, and canal networks now restrict sediment delivery, accelerate subsidence, and fragment ecosystems, pushing the delta into land loss and retrogradation. Key trends intensifying these pressures include rising temperatures, sea-level rise, stronger hurricanes (e.g., Katrina-type events), extreme rainfall and flooding, saltwater intrusion, biodiversity decline, and aging stormwater and levee infrastructure. Impacts are uneven: low-income and predominantly African American communities, particularly around New Orleans, face greater exposure, slower recovery, and higher displacement risk. A SWOT perspective highlights the delta’s strengths in its high biodiversity, natural flood-buffering wetlands, and culture of “living with water.” Yet weaknesses, outdated infrastructure, disrupted delta cycles, land loss, freshwater salinisation, and systemic social inequities, undermine resilience. Emerging opportunities include nature-based restoration, circular and sustainable economic development, agricultural innovation, and stronger youth and community engagement. At the same time, threats such as intensified climate events, subsidence in sinking urban areas, saltwater intrusion, and potential funding cuts to levee maintenance and sustainability projects jeopardise long-term stability. Integrated ecological restoration and socially just climate adaptation are therefore urgent priorities.