Great Lakes Echo (http://greatlakesecho.org/tag/Water-quality/page/26/)
This tag is further segmented with tags for pharmaceuticals, plastics, sewage, algae
(MI) Holland Sentinel – Rainwater infiltrating the separate sanitary sewer system in Holland, combined with power outages, led to the overflow of more than a million gallons of untreated sewage into Lake Macatawa on Saturday. Holland’s stormwater sewer lines are designed for rain, while sanitary sewers capture material from drains in homes and businesses. More
(MI) The Detroit News – Thousands of yellow rubber ducks raced down an Oakland County river to raise money for the Oakland Plus for Clean Water initiative. The first Duck Regatta, on Sunday afternoon outside the Cranbrook Institute of Science along the Kingswood shoreline, aided the nonprofit’s initiative in Oakland County and surrounding areas. The event also helps support the Oakland Plus environmental education programs in schools. More
(MI) Ludington Daily News – Ludington’s S.S. Badger is lauded, revered and adored for its uniqueness as the last operating coal-fired passenger ship in the United States. On the other, it faces environmental regulation for that very reason – coal, or, in this case, a coal-burning waste product, ash. With coal burning comes waste, emissions through the stack – specifically exempt from regulation by Wisconsin and Michigan state law – but also an ash slurry that is dumped daily into Lake Michigan. That ash discharge used to be considered normal operating procedure for coal-fired vessels. A 1973 portion of the U.S. Clean Water Act – when there were still more than 50 coal-fired vessels operating – stated discharges like the Badger’s, which are “incidental to normal operations,” were allowed.
(MN) Minnesota Star-Tribune – Shoreview is betting on a new “green” concrete paving method that lets rainwater pass right through the street surface to prevent damaging runoff. Pervious concrete — made of gravel and cement minus the sand that gives regular concrete its impenetrable density — has the porous quality of a Rice Krispies bar. Because it will allow water to drain straight to the ground below, Shoreview will install about a mile of pervious concrete streets without storm sewers in the Woodbridge neighborhood on Lake Owasso. More
(OH) The Toledo Blade – Spawning by lake sturgeon in Canadian waters of the Detroit River has been confirmed for the first time in 30 years, boosting hopes for continued recovery of this rare, ancient species in the river and adjoining waters of western Lake Erie. The spawning is occurring on a reef built last fall at the head of Fighting Island, across from Wyandotte, Mich., under an American-Canadian partnership. Sturgeon, considered an indicator of ecosystem health, are estimated at just one percent of their former numbers in the Detroit River. More
(ON) The Hamilton Spectator – As Canada and the United States prepare to mark the centennial of the Boundary Waters Treaty, key thinkers and organization leaders from both countries are calling for a new, 21st-century vision to protect and prevent further degradation of the Great Lakes-St. Lawrence River system over the next 100 years. They’re frustrated that neither Canada nor the U.S. has responded to the International Joint Commission’s call to rewrite the Great Lakes Water Quality Agreement of 1972. More
(NY) The New York Times – The Obama administration has rightly declared its support for Congressional efforts to restore the broad reach of the Clean Water Act. The law, passed in 1972, was intended to protect all of the waters of the United States, large and small. That mission has since been muddied by two Supreme Court decisions that narrowed the law’s scope, weakened its safeguards against pollution and confused federal regulators. The administration has written to Senate and House committees urging them to act on bills that would restore federal jurisdiction over all wetlands and streams. All of the environmental big guns signed: Nancy Sutley, the chairwoman of the White House Council on Environmental Quality; Lisa Jackson, the administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency; Ken Salazar, the interior secretary; Tom Vilsack, the agriculture secretary; and Terrence Salt, the acting chief of Army Corps of Engineers. More
(MI) Bay City Times – Fourteen agencies have been awarded more than $187,000 in state Water Quality Monitoring grants to assist with inland beach water quality monitoring for the 2009 and 2010 swimming seasons. The recipients include: The Central Michigan District Health Department, which received $22,424 to monitor 20 local beaches and three state park beaches in Arenac, Clare, Gladwin, Isabella, Osceola and Roscommon counties; and the District Health Department No. 2, which received $24,697 to monitor 10 local beaches, two state park beaches and one Department of Natural Resources access site in Alcona, Iosco, Ogemaw and Oscoda counties. More
(IN) The News Dispatch – For years researchers looked at the water of Lake Michigan to find the source of high bacteria readings, but one source of outbreaks of E. coli may be in the beach sand. Bacteria counts tend to be much higher after storms send waves splashing ashore, with water returning to the lake through the sand. If the sand is aerated and allowed to dry in the hot sun, the bacteria die or diminish. The Michigan City Parks Department is testing that theory with a new method of beach grooming that puts little furrows into the sand instead of leveling it. That method of beach sand grooming in Racine, Wis., resulted in a 96 percent decline in the number of beach advisories for bacteria.
(ON) The Windsor Star – For the first time in 30 years, lake sturgeon are spawning on the Canadian side of the Detroit River. “It is truly a breakthrough,” Matthew Child, director of watershed restoration with the Essex Region Conservation Authority, said Tuesday. Child said the four different kinds of rock bottoms built as spawning beds between Fighting Island and LaSalle were only completed last fall and scientists were prepared to wait to see if they’d be used. More