It should chill every wetland defender in America to hear that the Bush Administration is thinking of issuing "guidance" on how to interpret a bad ruling by the Bush-influenced Supreme Court on whether all wetlands, or just a few, merit protection under the Clean Water Act.
Be afraid, be very afraid, if you care about water resources.
TRAVERSE CITY, Mich. (AP) — The Bush administration is preparing instructions for regulators puzzling over which wetlands are covered by federal clean water law, a top Environmental Protection Agency official said Wednesday.
But the EPA hasn't decided whether to issue a comprehensive regulation on the issue in the wake of a confusing U.S. Supreme Court ruling in two Michigan wetlands cases, said Benjamin Grumbles, assistant administrator for water.
"Our overarching goal is to continue to protect wetlands under the Clean Water Act to the maximum extent allowable since the decision," Grumbles told The Associated Press in an interview. "Which tools are the best to use is a policy decision we haven't made yet."
This is the best the shipping lobby can do?
To say there are 182 invasive species in the lakes, with two-thirds arriving since the opening of the St. Lawrence Seaway, is to also say over 60 species arrived on their own or through another vector. In the big picture, we have a very serious problem with combined sewer outflow into the Great Lakes every time we have a bad rainstorm. Yet, we rarely see environmentalist groups calling for the closing of local waste water treatment plants.
Well, it's good to see the lobby admit that it's responsible for 2/3 of the problem. And as for shutting waste water treatment plants -- they actually protect the environment as their primary purpose. Ships don't.
But this is especially hard to take:
Shipping companies are working aggressively to find a solution to the introduction of non-indigenous species through ballast waters discharges.
They have been working not so aggressively for 20 years. When do we call their bluff?
http://www.detnews.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20060829/OPINION01/608290308/1008
The Keweenaw Peninsula is gorgeous, especially in leaf-peeping season, which is why we stopped by in late September a year ago. Lots of maples, oaks, white birch and aspen among the pines, and that makes for dazzling stuff once the weather cools a little.
But what differentiates the Keweenaw from, say, Door County (aside from the lack of fish boils and two-seater Jacuzzis) is that this was never just a place for summer cottages and resorts and gentle farms.
Before seasonal visitors began making their claims, this was Copper Country. Dreams happened in this place: Some died here, some moved on, some adjusted to lessened expectations.
http://www.mercurynews.com/mld/mercurynews/living/travel/15379973.htm
This goo is bad -- the dioxin that is harder to see is worse.
HUME TOWNSHIP -- The waters wrapping around Michigan's Thumb, where Saginaw Bay meets Lake Huron, are among Michigan's loveliest, hosting thousands of tourists each year. Last month, a flotilla of stately tall ships sailed through.
But residents on the bay say an ugly goo is polluting their beaches. Recently, a private water analyst hired by property owners gave weight to their concerns, releasing tests that show the muck washing up on one Huron County beach contains high levels of feces.
http://www.freep.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20060827/NEWS06/608270610/1008/NEWS
LANSING, Mich. (AP) — Gubernatorial candidates Dick DeVos and Jennifer Granholm both say business growth and environmental protection can go hand-in-hand.
But that doesn't stop the Democratic governor and her Republican challenger from differing significantly in how they approach environmental regulation in the state.
Granholm, for instance, supports legislation that would expand Michigan's 10-cent-per-bottle deposit on beer and soft drink bottles to other containers such as water and juice bottles. DeVos says that would be a mistake, although he agrees with Granholm that Michigan needs to create incentives to increase recycling.
“People who’ve never vacationed on Lake Michigan think ‘lake,’ ” said Jim Sellman, a real estate agent in Saugatuck, Mich. “They ought to think ‘ocean’ — freshwater ocean.”
Saugatuck developed on this particularly lustrous stretch of beach — there are hundreds of miles of beach on Michigan’s west coast — where the Kalamazoo River empties into the vast lake, 160 miles west of Detroit.
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/08/25/realestate/25havens.html?
On the ground, the new Great Lakes water pact (still not ratified) is making life interesting for communities along the edge of the Basin.
An interstate compact that bans large-scale water diversions from the Great Lakes basin put South Bend on the horns of a dilemma, according to Gary Gilot, director of public works.
Based on the slope of the land in the Studebaker corridor, Gilot said, it made engineering sense to direct the corridor's storm waters to a system of ditches that flow into the Kankakee River.
But the Kankakee lies outside the Great Lakes basin, so any such flow would violate the diversion ban.
Another alternative -- again based on slope -- would have dumped the waters into the St. Joseph River, upstream from the East Race recreational area.
But that would have compromised compliance with federal regulations on fecal coliform levels in recreational waters.
http://www.southbendtribune.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20060821/News01/608210363
Of the world's 263 international basins, three-fifths of them lack a feasible cooperative management framework. While water disputes alone are not likely to spark a conflict, they are likely to fuel already existent, long-standing tensions within and between states. Since 1948, close to 40 incidents of hostilities have taken place over water resources, most of which have taken place in the Middle East. In the Middle East, the Jordan River Basin and the Tigris-Euphrates Basin are the most likely regions of water-related conflict, while in Africa the Nile River, Volta River, Zambezi River, and the Niger Basin are conflict-prone zones.
In the 21st century, however, Asia may emerge as the new focal point of water-related conflict given the rapid growth of the region, which is likely to put pressure on water resources, coupled with the concentration of long-standing internal and inter-state tensions, which can act as a spark for turning water-related disputes into full-scale conflicts. Asia is home to 57 international basins, the third largest after Europe and Africa.
http://www.pinr.com/report.php?ac=view_report&report_id=545&language_id=1
One in three people is enduring one form or another of water scarcity, according to new findings released by the Comprehensive Assessment of Water Management in Agriculture at World Water Week in Stockholm. These alarming findings totally overrun predictions that this situation would come to pass in 2025.
http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2006-08/bc-ato081506.php
Lafarge North America Alpena Plant will limit mercury emissions to 567 pounds per year until its kiln modifications are completed, plant officials reported.
The cement producer reached a proposed agreement with the Michigan Department of Environmental Quality Friday regarding its mercury restrictions, ending a lawsuit filed by the company last year.
http://www.thealpenanews.com/stories/articles.asp?articleID=2476
Canadians might have a clearer insight into provincial/federal relations as a way of explaining this one. In the U.S., it's never bad to beat up on Washington, but it usually doesn't make a difference.
Warning signs have been posted at Port Stanley's main beach, on Lake Erie, for about a month, said MaryLynn Maerten, the health unit's acting manager of health protection.
"We continue to collect (water) samples and they're still adverse," she said.
http://lfpress.ca/newsstand/CityandRegion/2006/08/19/1764900-sun.html
HOLLAND, Mich. - A group dedicated to finding and documenting shipwrecks in Michigan's waters said Friday it found the well-preserved remains of the historic vessel Hennepin and two other ships at the bottom of Lake Michigan.
http://www.gazetteextra.com/shipwrecksfound081906.asp
Thanks to Anne Woiwode of the Sierra Club for highlighting this:
http://great-lakes.net/lists/enviro-mich/last30days/msg19823.html
I was just informed about the below proposal by the Coast Guard to establish 26 areas in the Great Lakes for “live fire gun exercises” to be conducted. Comments are due AUGUST 31. The exercises would be for one 2 to 3 day event per year (not clear if that means per area or for all the areas). The focus appears to be to try to assure that vessels are excluded from these areas when the exercises are on, but the proposal involves a categorical exclusion for environmental impacts. Some of the areas being identified include the major or significant migratory pathways in the region -- Whitefish Bay in Lake Superior, Saginaw Bay, Duluth, Grand Marais, Thunder Bay, etc.
http://www.record-eagle.com/2006/aug/16wrs.htm
TRAVERSE CITY — Neighbors of Williamsburg Receiving and Storage are being warned to avoid exposure to sulfur dioxide emitted from the cherry processing plant, based on U.S. Environmental Protection Agency air quality tests.
Groups in other states will soon be issuing their reports, too --
Communities around Lake Superior are demonstrating their support for protecting and restoring the Great Lakes by passing resolutions of support for the Collaboration Act. The cities of Duluth and Two Harbors, Western Lake Superior Sanitary District, Save the Lake Superior Association and the Duluth Environmental Advisory Council have passed resolutions of support in recent weeks.
To underscore Minnesota's need for a clean Lake Superior, a new report, "Protecting and Restoring Minnesota's North Shore" was recently released. The report can be downloaded at http://cleanwateraction.org/mn/duluth.htm.
Each day we wait, the problems get worse and the solutions get more costly. Lake Superior cannot afford to wait. We need to act now. The support of our Minnesota delegation is needed to demonstrate to the rest of the country that protecting the natural wonders of the Great Lakes should be a priority nationwide.
http://www.duluthsuperior.com/mld/duluthsuperior/news/editorial/15264891.htm
There must be better ways to waste taxpayers' money.
Leaving aside all other objections, and there are many, this notion ought to be shelved until the Seaway and its buds implements a 99.9999% effective method of preventing more invasions through ballast water. Not studies, not demonstrates, but implements.
The agency that operates the St. Lawrence Seaway hopes to reverse a 25-year decline in Great Lakes shipping by bringing more ocean freighters, so-called container ships, into the lakes.
The project, known as HWY H2O, could double the volume of freight currently shipped on the Great Lakes.
Environmentalists said allowing more ocean freighters into the St. Lawrence River could deliver more exotic species to the Great Lakes. Zebra mussels and other exotic species imported to the lakes over the past 40 years in freighter ballast water have hurt some fish populations, spawned toxic algae blooms and dramatically altered parts of the lakes' ecosystems.
http://www.mlive.com/news/muchronicle/index.ssf?/base/news-9/1155464142302760.xml&coll=8
Lake Superior practically insists on oceangoing metaphors. It's an inland sea, with a rockbound coast and a bottom dotted by shipwrecks. More than 40 percent of the nation's fresh surface water is in this lake, more than 10 percent of the world's. Drain the other Great Lakes and you could refill them from Superior, with enough left over for three extra Eries.
http://www.startribune.com/10089/story/609700.html
So, now we gaze out at Lake Superior and chuckle when environmentalists, conservationists and scientists warn the lake is in danger. C'mon, Superior is better than all the other lakes -- too big, too blue, too cold to crumble from a human sucker punch.
Once again, we are wrong.
http://www.startribune.com/10089/story/609696.html
SHELBY -- The race to develop more energy from renewable sources could spark proposals to build large wind turbines in Lake Michigan within five years, according to a government energy expert.
Because wind travels faster over water than land, the eastern half of Lake Michigan is considered an ideal place to build turbines that would generate electricity. Winds over the lake have the potential to reduce vast amounts of electricity, possibly as much as the entire state currently uses, said John Sarver, technical assistance supervisor for the state of Michigan's Energy Office.
http://www.mlive.com/news/muchronicle/index.ssf?/base/news-9/1155224752298410.xml&coll=8
Today's Tidbit: It was reported that at an unnamed life-saving station a crew of lifesavers, at the height of a roaring gale, were seen rowing out into the lake lashed by huge waves.
An onlooker shouted to the coxswain of the boat, "You fools, you'll never get back!" Where upon the coxswain replied, "The book only says we have to go out, it doesn't say we have to come back."
http://www.sheboygan-press.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20060808/SHE0101/608080427/1062/SHEnews
This new Congressional Budget Office report contains interesting, and troubling thoughts.
"The federal government could facilitate market transfers of water by clarifying the potential for broader water marketing using its jurisdiction under the commerce clause of the Constitution and federally reserved water rights. The commerce clause gives the Congress the authority to allocate interstate waters to serve the national interest -- even if doing so means overriding state law."
http://www.cbo.gov/showdoc.cfm?index=7471&sequence=0&from=7
Bill McKibben always has the most provocative things to say about environmentalism.
Environmentalism isn't dying. In fact, the need for it has never been greater. But it has to transform itself into something so different that the old name really won't apply. It has to be about a new kind of culture, not a new kind of filter; it has to pay as much attention to preachers and sociologists as it does to scientists; it has to care as much about the carrot in the farmers market as it does about the caribou on the Arctic tundra. That's what the printouts on atmospheric concentrations of carbon dioxide tell us, and it's a message echoed by the researchers studying happiness and satisfaction. We don't need a slightly rejiggered version of the world we now inhabit; we need to start working on changes on the scale of the problems we face.
http://www9.nationalgeographic.com/ngm/0608/voices.html
To the Anishnabe tribes of northern Michigan, fish is more than just food. It's a link with past generations, a symbol of cultural identity.
And that makes mercury contamination a particularly touchy matter. Tribal leaders walk a fine line between encouraging their citizens to retain ancient traditions and cautioning them against the modern threat of tainted fish, the leading cause of human mercury poisoning.
http://record-eagle.com/2006/aug/07mercury.htm
Gitchi Gumee means "big water,'' and in award-winning Michigan author Anne Margaret Lewis' new children's book, "Gitchi Gumee,'' that water could be any big lake or the ocean. Illustrated by Kathleen Chaney Fritz, also of Michigan, "Gitchi Gumee'' is about an Indian boy learning wisdom from the water.
http://www.mackinacislandpress.com/books_gitchi.html
A love affair ... no, that’s not the kind I mean. Love is probably a poor choice of words, maybe an attraction or attitude would be better, anyway, I’m talking about my personal fascination with Lake Superior.
It must have started about 65 years ago, when my sister and I first spent a week on the North Shore with my mom and dad. We rented a little one-room, bare-bones cabin called Nelson’s Cozy Cabins, just before you get to Two Harbors.
I was about 10 years old, but I could tell this was a body of water like no other. Instead of sandy shores, where you could wade around trying to catch minnows, there were 35-foot sheer cliffs, bare snarly rocks below, with swells of waves surging, white and noisy. A frisky kid could defiantly get more than a stubbed toe around here. \\
http://www.grandmarais-mn.com/placed/index.php?sect_rank=5&story_id=223300
An environmental group has sued federal regulators on grounds they failed to protect beaches and the Great Lakes from pollution.
http://www.cbs47.tv/news/state/story.aspx?content_id=cba54752-e258-4253-bd79-a286d171c09b&rss=154
Some people won't believe in it until they melt.
I read that Joe Soucheray doesn't believe in this global warming glop ("I already do my part, and I don't even believe in this stuff," July 30). He may not have heard, but this isn't a matter of debate any more. He doesn't believe it's happening, but people who understand the science know it's happening and why it's happening.
Many people don't realize how much we do know. Some people believe there is "real" controversy around this issue. What is desperately needed is to inform the public. A quality newspaper should be doing that. This has been supported on your news pages.
For a prominent columnist to cast doubt on science that is well understood is irresponsible. Especially when the stakes are so high. I suppose Soucheray thinks that scientists may not have thought about the naturally occurring statistical variations in the earth's temperature. Come on, Joe. Where is the garage logic?
http://www.twincities.com/mld/twincities/news/editorial/15183127.htm
This is a first-class summary of the issues involved in whether the Michigan Supreme Court will take up the historic case involving Michigan's first large scale spring water pumping and bottling facility.
A small Mecosta County-based citizens group, which has for five years mounted legal challenges against the authority of the world’s largest food company to pump Michigan’s spring water and sell it anywhere, is awaiting word from the state Supreme Court on whether it will hear the group’s case.
http://mlui.org/landwater/fullarticle.asp?fileid=17072
Happy news in a world in turmoil...
Last year, biologists counted 58 pairs of piping plovers — a record for the Great Lakes region. Most were located in Michigan, primarily downstate.
This summer, roughly 50 plover pairs have been discovered, including almost a dozen in the Upper Peninsula. The federal recovery goal set for the species in the Great Lakes is 150 pairs.
This year, biologists were excited to discover plovers nesting on a small island off Aronson Island in Escanaba.
"We've never had any birds nesting in that part of Delta County for at least 30 years," Sheffield said.