For Some in Plaquemines, No Power in Sight

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One thing's for sure, until the flooding has subsided there will be no work at the plaque mines.

I didn't realize they had electricity in Louisiana

Grammar matters and Darwin rules. There are a lot of incorrect assumptions about the National Flood Insurance Program (NFIP) apparent in the comments. Here are some facts: In the 1960s, risk assessors and actuaries evaluated flood risks and potential losses in coastal and flood plains - determined that few could afford, let-alone accept, the premiums required by an avaricious industry to cover certain losses - which is why coastal and floodplain risks - like probable "frakking" losses today, were determined to be effectively uninsurable. No sane financial institution will finance uninsurable risks. This meant that most of Florida, much of Mississippi and Louisiana and part of Texas, amongst other areas, threatened to become unusable when commercial insurers declined to cover flood events at affordable rates. As some of these areas were important to the USA or its politicians (for oil, for shipping, for votes), they introduced NFIP in the late 1960s, not realizing at the time that these areas would become uninhabitable later this century due to sea level rises, saline ingress into aquifers  and increasingly more severe weather. Today, knowing that this progression is inevitable, it would be sensible to retreat from these doomed areas immediately, but it is unlikely to happen given that many Americans are still in deep denial that global anthropic climate change even exists - and that these areas remain significant. Even if they did recognise the risk and costs, most politicians are as poor as the general population at evaluating exponential progressions and long term risks - and so tend to discount future risks and costs even when they are, as here, both huge and certain. NFIP rates are based on flood hazard levels and as NFIP identifies flood plains it requires communities participating in NFIP to prevent building in high risk zones. This means that people choosing to live in flood plains need to be either desperate and stupid, or wealthy as well as stupid. Thus, NFIP and Darwin typically limit the period in which people attempt to live on flood plains. Flood damage is often accompanied by storm damage - which NFIP doesn't cover, just as other insurers will not cover flood damage or other high risk/high value losses. As "other insurance" is provided by [strike]corporate profiteers[strike] commercial insurers, and they generally charge a significant "Hurricane Premium" in hurricane areas and probably will decline to issue coverage if they predict major losses; and as financing isn't available without insurance, the withdrawal by "other insurers" will likely prevent rebuilding long before NFIP gives up on an area. After taking a significant loss on a property, NFIP will cover "the three Rs." Raze, raise or roll. In other words, move the building to somewhere where it doesn't flood (roll), lift the building above the existing flood line (raise), or demolish the remnants (raze) and require condemnation of the area by the local authorities, preventing further exposure. NFIP only pays the replacement cost value (RCV) of a building when it is insured for 80% of its value or more, and only the "Actual Cash Value" (ACV) which is the cost after taking depreciation and obsolescence of appurtenances or contents. There is always a $350,000 cap on the total value paid out and other relatively low caps for various categories of loss - meaning that the insured carries at least some, and often a significant component, of the cost of repair or replacement. Which is why deciding to stay, and possibly take another loss, even if NFIP doesn't condemn the area (which it will do after a third loss), involves money as well as stupidity. NFIP is, like most "benefits" provided by the US Government, an actuarially validated, self-funded program, and the only time it could hypothetically "cost" tax payers money, is, like other government provided insurance, if a huge disaster required more funds than under management by the fund. This would ultimately be recovered through an increase in premiums or written off in the event that the government determined that the public interest - or their reelection chances - would be better served by doing so. Note that this invalidates assertions about NFIP being equivalent to "socialism" - although the people making such assertions typically do not realize that the people, even the poorest, living in socialist states, particularly the Scandinavian ones, are much better off than than Americans except for the very wealthiest.  For more about NFIP, consult http://www.floodsmart.gov