Wedding venue in Blue Ridge, GA for couples in Wilmington, NC

WILMINGTON, N.C. — Most people this time of year are seeing their cars coated in pollen.

Ivy Miller, however, says her car is always coated in dust. It’s a problem she says she’s been dealing with since she moved into her neighborhood of Sunset Park near Wilmington's port in 2018.

What You Need To Know

After six years, Miller is pushing back and wants answers. The N.C. Department of Environmental Quality Division of Air Quality says it’s received multiple complaints from four Sunset Park residents since mid-December.

Miller's neighbor, Ed Foraker, says he and his wife have been dealing with the issue for eight years, adding that it’s been worse than usual the past few months.

“The last three or four months, it’s every day,” Foraker said. “I have to run my wipers to get the sawdust so I can see out the windshield.”

Miller says she can tell she’s been breathing something in.

“I’ve never had allergies, my voice has never sounded this raspy constantly, I wake up and I’m like completely, like I can’t even breathe through my nose, and you know I cough a lot more now, I’m constantly clearing my throat,” she said. “There’s very obviously something wrong with the air.”

Wherever the dust is coming from, Miller says she’s worried about the long-term effects breathing it in might have.

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency says exposure to fugitive dust can aggravate asthma and worsen respiratory and cardiovascular conditions.

That’s why it's important to control fugitive dust.

The state Division of Air Quality says state regulations requires a facility to prevent dust from extending beyond property boundaries. Residents of the Sunset Park neighborhood live within miles of two facilities: Eviva Biomass and Basaga International.

The air quality agency says between December and January, Enviva Biomass had issues with two hatch doors causing a dust leak. The agency says that’s been fixed. The agency says more recently, dust was found blowing over from Basaga International.

“Staff are frequently in the area working to ensure all facilities at the port, including Enviva Biomass and Basaga International don’t create any off-site dust issues,” the agency said.

It sent a letter to Basaga International saying the company has 30 days upon receiving the letter to identify the source of fugitive dust and 60 days to come up with a plan to control it.

Once agency approves that plan, the company has 30 days to be in compliance.

Spectrum News 1 has reached out to Enviva Biomass and Basaga International for comment. Enviva has declined to comment and Basaga has not responded to the request.

What’s the context?

How growing battles over real estate development and flood risk are playing out in one community on the U.S. East Coast

WILMINGTON, North Carolina - Robert Parr drove his white pickup truck near a set of new buildings near the beachfront in New Hanover County, North Carolina – an area he says is prone to flooding.

"That's crazy. That never should have gone in here," he told Context, referring to new development blocks away from the U.S. East Coast.

"Whenever I get on the phone with the county, usually within 30 days we have significant flooding," said the former oceanographer, after opening a presentation and flicking through slides of flooded roads and areas around the region.

The burgeoning county has faced a barrage of recent storms and is at major risk of flooding again over the next 30 years, according to First Street Foundation, a climate risk tracking group.

Parr and other activists are racing to prevent another major development on an approximately eight-acre patch of land farther north, across from downtown Wilmington, in a spot uniquely prone to flooding.

Precisely how to build in floodplains and areas most at risk from climate change amid continued population growth is an issue U.S. officials are grappling with as people and developers move into – not away from – perils like flooding and wildfires.

"The challenge of managing climate risk in the long term is much, much harder if we continue to develop in hazardous places the way we have been to date," said Miyuki Hino, assistant professor in the Department of City and Regional Planning at the University of North Carolina.

Robert Parr, former oceanographer (left), and Kemp Burdette with Cape Fear River Watch (right) are pictured on the Cape Fear River near downtown Wilmington, North Carolina, USA, February 29, 2024. Thomson Reuters Foundation/David Sherfinski

Robert Parr, former oceanographer, examines a wrecked boat at a site across the Cape Fear River from downtown Wilmington in North Carolina, USA, February 29, 2024. Thomson Reuters Foundation/David Sherfinski

A hurricane flood level chart is pictured in New Hanover County, North Carolina, USA, February 28, 2024. Thomson Reuters Foundation/David Sherfinski

Robert Parr, former oceanographer (left), and Kemp Burdette with Cape Fear River Watch (right) are pictured on the Cape Fear River near downtown Wilmington, North Carolina, USA, February 29, 2024. Thomson Reuters Foundation/David Sherfinski

Development

For years, local officials have been grappling with what to do with a tract of land along the western bank of the Cape Fear River across from Wilmington – an area that floods relatively routinely even outside of major storms.

Much of the patch nearby is still zoned industrial, and options range from expanding open space to rezoning the area to allow for high-density, mixed-use development.

Developers had proposed three multi-story towers, 550 condominium units and 300 apartments for a spot known as Point Peter, at the confluence of the Cape Fear River and Northeast Cape Fear River, but the project stalled in 2021 as county officials wanted more time to assess longer-term plans.

Kirk Pugh of KFJ Development Group, the project's developer, is frustrated with the slow pace – and said building in and around the Cape Fear River area can be done safely.

The original concept included a "sacrificial first floor" and a stormwater capture and release design among the features, he noted, that would allow water to move "freely" if a freshwater flooding event occurred.

"The argument that we shouldn't build in a floodplain ... well, most of our county is in a floodplain," he said.

Those opposed to building up the area say it does not make sense to pursue even scaled-back versions, given the long-term trends of sea level rise and climate change fuelling more intense storms and flooding in the region.

"Risky isn't even the right word," said Kemp Burdette with Cape Fear River Watch, an advocacy group. "Risk indicates that something might happen or it might not happen. A flood over there is inevitable."

Wilmington's location toward the end of the massive Cape Fear River Basin and just west of the Atlantic Ocean makes it uniquely at risk for flooding from multiple sources, including natural sea level rise.

Out of 40 areas across the U.S., Wilmington experienced the biggest increase in "nuisance", or high tide, flooding days due to tidal changes over the past 70 years or so, according to a 2021 study from University of Central Florida researchers.

And in New Hanover County, 40% of properties have greater than a 26% chance of being severely affected by flooding over the next three decades, according to projections from First Street.

'Pick their poison'

Part of the challenge for planners – both in the southeastern U.S. and other fast-growing parts of the country - is a lack of developable land coupled with a population boom, even with the possibility of stronger hurricanes and storms.

Between 1996 and 2017, more than 10 new residences were built in North Carolina's floodplains for every property removed through government buyout programmes aimed in part at cutting flood risk, Hino and other researchers found in a study published last year.

New Hanover County's population grew by 11%, to about 225,000, between 2010 and 2020, compared to 7.4% growth for the country as a whole.

And with little developable land left, there are only so many places for new projects to sprout.

"This population growth is happening even in the face of additional flooding. We have had several hurricanes since (2016), and people are still moving here," said Rebekah Roth, planning and land use director for New Hanover County.

Lured by lower costs of living and amenities like proximity to water, people across the U.S. have migrated to areas most at risk of adverse climate effects like flooding, wildfires, and extreme heat, according to a 2023 study from the real estate company Redfin.

Daryl Fairweather, Redfin's chief economist, moved from Seattle, Washington to Wisconsin in the Midwest in 2020, partly to escape worsening wildfire smoke – only to run into the poor air quality that permeated much of the U.S. from record wildfires in Canada last year.

"There's no place in the country that doesn't have climate risk," Fairweather said. "I think people are just going to have to pick their poison (on) what climate risk they are willing to tolerate."

'Living with water'

Just down the river from Point Peter, the Battleship North Carolina – a World War II vessel and major tourist attraction - has launched a project known as "Living with Water" that will restore part of its parking lot to wetland habitat and elevate the rest.

At a kick-off ceremony several weeks ago, the parking lot flooded.

"It was a beautiful thing, you know," retired U.S. Navy Captain Terry Bragg, the site's executive director, quipped as he guided a tour on part of the ship.

"You could literally not walk directly from the parking lot into the visitors center because of the flooding. You had to scurry around (and) climb through the bushes - which was OK for messaging."

Other U.S. states are also eyeing new ways to adapt – including restrictions on where and how to build in risky areas.

After torrential rains devastated Vermont last year, state lawmakers have been working on legislation that would require a state permit to build near rivers.

And in Tennessee, lawmakers this month beat back an effort to unwind restrictions surrounding development in wetland areas.

For those areas and more coastal spots like New Hanover, time is running out. Burdette of the river advocacy group said that by 2050, the Point Peter site will be underwater.

"2050 sounds like a long way off, but it's not even a mortgage payment away. It's not even a generation away," he said. "It just seems so reckless to do it."

(Reporting by David Sherfinski; Editing by Zoe Tabary.)

As John Willse and Beth Guertin, owners of Wilmington Wine bottle shop and now the recently opened Creative Tastings restaurant on Castle Street know all too well, sometimes your purpose or direction in life chooses you rather than the other way around.

After a career in the restaurant business elsewhere, Willse found himself pulled to move back to his hometown of Wilmington.

“I have been in the service industry for more than 30 years,” Willse said. “I was a touring musician and was making money where I could the old-fashioned way as a cook, as a bartender, as a server until I devoted the whole of my time eventually to music and touring. When I left the road, I fell back into the industry.”

Willse worked as general manager of a four-star Italian restaurant in New Orleans.

“I developed and maintained a Wine Spectator award-winning wine list in my time. After New Orleans, I moved to New York and was a startup manager for a three-star French restaurant in Manhattan, working with some of the greatest restauranteurs in the city at the time and to this day,” he said.

The move to Wilmington came after living abroad and owning a business in Thailand.

Wilmington Wine was already an established wine shop staple on Castle Street in Wilmington when Willse entered the picture in 2015. “But I had a great relationship with the owners at the time, and they asked if I would be willing to throw my hat in the ring to acquire it,” he said. “The decision wasn’t without difficulty, but sometimes, your direction finds you rather than you it. It’s now impossible to see myself without Wilmington Wine. From infrastructure to ambiance, we are extremely proud of what we have built over the last eight years.”

Willse and Guertin connected through their love of music, history, travel and wine.

“I had recently graduated with my master’s degree in history with a focus on Southeast Asia,” Guertin said. “We both loved cultural diversity, and at the heart of every culture is food and drink.”

Guertin was born in Seoul, and though she moved to the U.S. at the age of 2, her love of cultural heritage and travel encouraged her to study her own background. When the opportunity presented itself to expand the business recently with Creative Tastings, she considered it her calling.

“For me, Creative Tastings is a product of my lifetime. I am an artist, and food is my medium,” Guertin said.

Creative Tastings, 701 Castle St., pairs with Wilmington Wine – now next door – to bring food offerings and dinner events. It has a limited bar menu Tuesdays-Saturdays from 5 p.m. to 9 p.m. and Sunday brunch.

Monthly events have included an oyster roast featuring Wilmington-based Three Little Spats Oyster Co. and a wine-and-cheese pairing of northern European cheeses.

This year, for St. Patrick’s Day, they are offering a special Irish-inspired menu for the week, with plans for an Easter Sunday brunch as well.

Another regular offering focuses on Guertin’s love of Korean food with counter-service style for Korean street food on Sundays between 11 a.m. and 2 p.m.

“I traveled to Cambodia to do some field work at Angkor in Siem Reap, the first far-roaming international trip of my life,” Guertin said. “On the way, I stopped in Seoul for a few days and absolutely fell in love with the place, people and, of course, the food. It became a habit for me to host Korean BBQ dinners for friends, and at Wilmington Wine we would often host potlucks, so I could share my food. When the opportunity presented itself to acquire a restaurant space, it was a no-brainer. Now, I could finally take my love of cooking and share it with the community as a whole.”

Willse said their decision to move and expand was based on two factors.

One was the need for a physical move. They had outgrown Wilmington Wine’s previous spot at 605 Castle St., and they got word that the 701 Castle St. space less than a block away was becoming available.

“Secondly, Beth is one of the most talented and creative people I have ever known,” Willse said. “She is an amazing artist in a multitude of mediums; there was never even a question that she would rise to the challenge. She was very receptive to the idea, and we acquired the space for our restaurant.”

Creative Tastings, or Wilmington Wine 2.0 as Willse calls it, boasts more space and more convenience.

“We now have a full bar which is to say that, in addition to wine and beer, we now offer spirits with a host of rotating cocktails,” Willse said.

The new name also came naturally to Willse and Guertin.

“When we decided it was time to really dive into a culinary venture, the name Creative Tastings was a perfect fit,” Guertin said. “Our goal was to create menus that were outside the familiar Southern fare and existing offerings in Wilmington. Knowing Korean-influenced food would be the base for the restaurant, we initially thought of a few Korean names but decided Creative Tastings was a much better fit since it would not pigeonhole us into one specific cuisine.”

Land sinking on the North Carolina coast could lead to thousands more people facing threats from high-tide flooding, according to a new study.

Researchers used satellite measurements to understand how 32 coastal cities, including Wilmington, are rising or sinking and then modeled flooding under different emissions scenarios. The study, “Disappearing cities on US coasts,” was published in the peer-reviewed journal Nature.

About 2,250 additional people in Wilmington will be exposed to high-tide flooding if subsidence continues at the same pace, the researchers found, with the value of homes exposed to flooding in the Southeastern North Carolina city rising from $570 million in 2020 dollars to $950 million. The study was conducted by researchers at Virginia Tech University, Brown University, the University of East Anglia and IISER Mohali in Punjab, India.

If coastal planners fail to account for how subsidence worsens the impact of rising seas, the authors warned, they will not accurately understand how many of their residents will be harmed by future floods.

“People only think of 100-year floods and sea-level rise and planning for those, but they do not think about how what happens on the land could significantly increase the trends that they already have in most communities,” Leonard Ohenhen, a Virginia Tech Ph.D. candidate studying coastal vulnerability, said in an interview.

North Carolina’s average rate of subsidence is about 1.4 millimeters per year, with a maximum rate of 4 mm per year, Ohenhen said. If those stayed consistent for a century, that would mean that state’s coast sinks between 5.5 and 15.75 inches.

“That would definitely have an effect on flooding extent for the coast,” Ohenhen said.

The Outer Banks are subsiding more quickly than the southern part of the North Carolina coast, with a 2016 research paper finding that Duck is sinking at a rate of 2 mm per year. That’s about 7.9 inches over 100 years.

At the same time, sea levels globally are rising about 4 mm per year.

Land subsidence is not accounted for in some sea level rise projections, which focus primarily on the expansion of water as it warms and on the addition of water to oceans as ice sheets near the poles melt.

As land sinks, though, the effects of rising waters are exacerbated. That impact is best accounted for in relative sea level rise measurement.

Subsidence can be caused by geologic forces or by human activity.

Sinking land caused by geologic forces happens slowly, often over the course of thousands of years, said Andrea Hawkes, a professor at the University of North Carolina Wilmington’s Center for Marine Sciences.

Known as glacial isostatic adjustment, the change is occurring because the sheer weight of glaciers pushed gooey magma under the earth’s crust to the edge of the continent during the last ice age, about 18,000 years ago. When the ice melted, Hawkes said, pressure on the inner part of the continent eased up, allowing the molasses-like magma to creep back toward the inner part of the continent.

That process is causing Wilmington to sink about 1.2 to 1.5 mm per year, Hawkes said, or about 4.7 to 5.9 inches a century. That’s less than coastal cities to the north like Virginia Beach and Atlantic City and more than the Georgia or Florida coasts.

Another geologic factor that can cause subsidence is the compaction of sediment, particularly in coastal areas where the underlying rocks tend to be newer.

That’s less of a factor around Wilmington than in other coastal areas, Roger Shew, a University of North Carolina Wilmington geology professor, said in an email.

“We are underlain by harder rocks over much of the area that are nearer the surface because of a special geologic positive feature that is less compressible/less compaction,” Shew wrote, adding that some areas like Eagles Island on the western side of the Cape Fear River and marshes are subsiding more quickly.

Pumping water from aquifers for drinking water or industrial uses can also lead to subsidence, often much more quickly than the geologic factors.

The same process plays out on the Gulf Coast with oil and gas drilling.

“Within a very short timeframe you can see the effects of such extraction on the rate of sinking in a community,” Ohenhen said.

The study’s subsidence estimate for Wilmington is likely conservative, Hawkes said.

Part of that is because the researchers used current rates of subsidence and projected them forward to 2050. Subsidence often doesn’t take place in a linear fashion, though, particularly if it’s caused by pumping groundwater.

Another factor is Wilmington’s steady population growth and the development patterns that is causing.

If more intense development happens in places that used to hold marshes, Hawkes said, that could mean increased weight on rock that is still settling. Adding pressure there could mean increased localized subsidence, further increasing the threat posed by flooding.

Some of those places are obvious, like low-lying Eagles Island, which is currently being eyed for development. But elsewhere in the city, places where people could be most vulnerable to flooding exacerbated by subsidence are along creeks that rise and fall with the tides.

“They aren’t the ones on the oceanfront, they aren’t the ones necessarily on the river. They’re the ones up these creeks that see this flooding in a devastating way,” Hawkes said.

When friends or colleagues are thinking about buying homes in Southeastern North Carolina, Hawkes urges them to consider the property’s elevation. A home should sit at least 15 feet above sea level to be safe, Hawkes said, and ideally 20 feet or higher.

“People have to be smarter about where they choose to develop,” Hawkes said.

It’s impossible to counter the effects of longer-term subsidence caused by compressed sediments or by the Earth’s crust gradually shifting. But there are efforts to repair some effects of human-caused subsidence.

Amanda Martin, North Carolina’s chief resilience officer, pointed to wetland restoration as one way that subsidence could be mitigated. Taking land that was ditched and drained for agricultural use and returning it to a peatland or a pocosin would allow it to hold more water and prevent sinking, Martin said in an interview.

“If we can basically re-wet the soil, it will hold more water and it will be better for the natural habitat that we’re trying to restore,” Martin said.

In Virginia, the Hampton Roads Sanitation District is working on a $1 billion project that aims to treat 10 to 20 million gallons of wastewater a day and then pump it back into the over-drawn aquifer underneath the region. The project could scale up to 100 million gallons a day pumped back into the aquifer.

By refilling the aquifer, the Sustainable Water Initiative for Tomorrow project aims to reverse decades of withdrawals and effectively prevent the low-lying region from sinking further.

“The lesson here is that we do not want everything to go on as usual and secondly we do not want it to be worse than what the current rate is because that would significantly increase the number of current people that are affected,” Ohenhen said.

This story was produced with financial support from the Hartfield Foundation and Green South Foundation, in partnership with Journalism Funding Partners, as part of an independent journalism fellowship program. The N&O maintains full editorial control of the work. If you would like to help support local journalism, please consider signing up for a digital subscription, which you can do here.

This story was originally published March 14, 2024, 8:00 AM.

919-829-4669

Adam Wagner covers climate change and other environmental issues in North Carolina. His work is produced with financial support from the Hartfield Foundation and Green South Foundation, in partnership with Journalism Funding Partners, as part of an independent journalism fellowship program. Wagner’s previous work at The News & Observer included coverage of the COVID-19 vaccine rollout and North Carolina’s recovery from recent hurricanes. He previously worked at the Wilmington StarNews.

WILMINGTON, N.C. (WECT) - One of Wilmington’s most well-known breweries is shutting up shop.

New Anthem Beer Project announcing on social media Wednesday that its location on Dock Street is closed indefinitely. The taproom and production facility on Greenfield Street will do the same Sunday. The brewery had previously said financial issues and problems stemming from production growth during the pandemic as reasons for the closure.

For regulars at the business, the news came as a shock.

“I was with them for the grand opening, and I’ve been there ever since, following them. They make the best IPAs, New England IPAs around,” customer Kim Stutts said. “It’s a sad day, it’s a sad day. They’re truly going to be missed because they were a great brewery and the staff was phenomenal and the brewers as well.”

The brewery had been in operation for years, with several beers gaining national recognition.

“I’ve visited some breweries in New York City, Washington D.C., Oregon, California and in my opinion this is the best,” customer Juanma Rodriguez said. “They are not afraid to explore new ways to create beers.”

However, the popularity of the beers wasn’t enough to keep the brewery afloat.

New Anthem announced it was closing its Raleigh location at the beginning of the month as well.

In a post about that closure, the company said “The mill has been full of rumors for weeks about the fate of New Anthem Beer, and yes, we’re struggling. We have been for a while. The list is long on the reasons why… Top of the list… debt and expansion before/during COVID and the hangover from COVID that just will not go away.”

The craft brewing industry has been struggling nationwide. After a quick growth over the past decade, recent statistics have been sobering.

The North Carolina Craft Brewers Guild said in the state in 2017, 54 breweries opened and 9 closed. In 2023, 34 breweries opened and 17 closed across the state.

Today, there are 420 breweries in North Carolina. Although the industry is on a decline in most places, the guild says “We are certainly beating the national average for all businesses and breweries.”

Mark Said, the CEO of Leland Brewing Company said it’s not a great sign that New Anthem is having to close.

“New Anthem has been a staple in our community and we are saddened by the news,” Said said. “Their loss only strengthens the need for our communities to support our local businesses. The closing of New Anthem and several other prominent breweries around the country is concerning as the post-Covid world has not been kind to our industry.”

WECT did reach out to New Anthem’s owner for comment but were told he isn’t ready to make a statement on the decision.

New Anthem’s social media post says there will likely be some deals on beer, merchandise, and glassware this weekend.

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