Water

Photo Friday: Kitch-iti-kipi spring

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Lake, brown and brook trout are found in the 45 degree Kitch-iti-kipi spring at Palms Book State Park in Manistique, Mich. The water moves through porous sandstone and is discharged into a pond at 10,000 gallons a minute. Visitors can watch the roiling of the clean sands some 40 feet below from a viewing raft. “It’s a fascinating ever-changing floor,” said Peggy Riemer, who captured these images last October. She recently posted similar images and information on NASA’s Earth Science Picture of the Day.

Water

Short’s Brewing ties seasonal beers to Clean Water Campaign

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Short’s Brewing Company in Bellaire, Mich. released its American Double IPA “Superfluid” this spring. (Photo: Short’s Brewing Company)Short’s Brewing Co. in Bellaire, Mich. is using the creation of one of its popular summer beers to draw attention to an oil pipeline that the company fears could taint the waters of the Great Lakes.

Water

Sales from specialty Ohio license plates help clean Lake Erie

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Sales from specialized license plates in Ohio are resulting in $60,000 in grants to help clean up the state’s only Great Lake. A pair of Ohio’s plates raised money for the Lake Erie Protection Fund, which was established to finance research and implementation projects to protect and restore Lake Erie and its watershed. One plate featured the  Lake Erie “life ring,” while the other showcased Marblehead Lighthouse, a state landmark north of Sandusky across the Sandusky Bay. The plates are sold for an additional $25, with $15 of that going to protecting Lake Erie. According to the Ohio Lake Erie Commission, the $60,000 raised will be spent on four separate projects totaling $15,000 each.

Waste

Disclosure stirs Lake Huron nuclear waste worries

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Ongoing concern over a proposed nuclear waste site very near Lake Huron took a new twist recently. A Canadian government review panel is exploring the viability of a new underground storage facility in Kincardine, Ontario. That’s about 111 miles across the water from Port Huron. The facility is almost a half mile underground but little more than a kilometer from the lake. It would hold low to intermediate radioactive waste.

Land

Researchers warn of health and environmental concerns surrounding livestock farms

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By Kate Golden
Wisconsin Center for Investigative Journalism

Six leading researchers at Johns Hopkins University’s Bloomberg School of Public Health are warning northeastern Wisconsin rural residents that over-application of manure at intensive livestock operations could cause them a host of health problems and damage the environment. The authors, all at the school’s Center for a Livable Future, cited dozens of studies, including one 2005 article suggesting that 71 percent of Wisconsin dairy farms generate more manure than needed by the cropland where it’s applied. A growing body of evidence has implicated the generation and management of manure from intensive livestock operations in the spread of infectious disease (including antibiotic-resistant strains), the introduction of microbial and chemical contaminants into ground and surface waters, impacts to air quality, and the wide range of adverse health, social, ecological and economic outcomes that result from these events, according to the March 27 letter. The letter was requested by Kewaunee CARES, a Kewaunee County water quality advocacy group that has criticized the intensity and oversight of large dairies in the area. The county is in northeastern Wisconsin, which has some of the densest livestock farming in the state.