Waste

Opportunity at the trash dumps

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(MI) Detroit Free Press – The stunning 16% drop in trash going into Michigan landfills for the year ending last Sept. 30 is as good a barometer as any of how poorly the state fared during that time. Michigan trash alone dropped 13%; waste from outside the state, including Canadian trash, failed to materialize by an even wider margin. And here’s another way to look at the numbers: Michigan’s household trash dropped 11%; the other categories, mostly industrial and construction waste, dropped 19%. Maybe some people are recycling more, but more likely everyone’s simply producing less trash — nowhere as obviously as at factories and construction sites.

Echo

Governors await date to discuss Asian carp

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(OH) The Toledo Blade – Great Lakes governors should learn this week when and where the Obama Administration plans to meet with them to address the Asian carp crisis.  

Nancy Sutley, chairman of the White House Council on Environmental Quality, said in a letter Wednesday to Michigan Gov. Jennifer Granholm and Wisconsin Gov. Jim Doyle that she wants to convene a summit the first week of February in either the Great Lakes region or in Washington. More

Water

Judge gives parties in Fox River PCB cleanup dispute 10 days

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(WI) Green Bay Post-Gazette – The federal judge overseeing the Fox River PCB cleanup dispute has given the parties 10 days to develop a strategy for resolving remaining issues in the complex case. U.S. District Judge William Griesbach stated in a written ruling he would consider postponing final judgment only if secondary issues can be resolved “within the vicinity of a half year’s time or less.” More

Echo

Cleaner river = global warming?

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(IL) Chicago Tribune – Chicago is the only major U.S. city that doesn’t disinfect its sewage, and the agency that treats its wastewater has a new reason for opposing the idea: It’s bad for the environment. Engineers with the Metropolitan Water Reclamation District of Greater Chicago recently completed an in-house study of its carbon footprint at the request of the elected board of commissioners. Going beyond the assignment, they also decided to look at how the footprint would change if it had to kill bacteria in sewage before pouring it into the Chicago River. More

Echo

Great Lakes Fish Corp. fined $10,250 for violations

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(ON) The Windsor Star – Great Lakes Fish Corporation, a Wheatley commercial fishing company, has been fined $10,250 for commercial fishing violations. GLFC, an owner of commercial fishing licences, pleaded guilty in two separate courts to five counts of violating the terms and conditions of a commercial fishing licence. More

Water

Ont. must update rules to stop pollution of Great Lakes

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(ON) Winnepeg Free Press – Environmentalists are calling on the Ontario government to update its regulations in order to stop the pollution of the Great Lakes. Ecojustice, Great Lakes United and Environmental Defence are asking the Environment Ministry to review and amend nine regulations that they claim have become stagnant and ineffective. The groups say some 140 major industries that were supposed to be regulated are still dumping wastewater into municipal sewers, and allowing toxic pollution to enter Ontario’s sewage treatment facilities. More

Water

Lake Erie and Ohio River are designated waterways

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(OH) Cleveland Plain Dealer – The Ohio River and Lake Erie have been designated Marine Highway Corridors to promote the use of waterways to move people and freight and ease congestion on roads and rail lines. “Ohio has 716 navigable miles of waterways, and they are utilized at 30 percent of the capacity,” ODOT spokesman Scott Varner said. “There is so much room for growth. Ohio is really a maritime state despite what people think.” More

Water

Data show fewer, larger salmon

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(MI) Traverse City Record-Eagle – Michigan fisheries officials are seeing signs that a move to reduce the number of Chinook salmon released into Lake Michigan is improving the balance between the popular game fish and its prey. Preliminary data suggest there are fewer — but larger — Chinook in the lake than in previous years. That trend would provide further evidence that stocking cuts in 2006 are having the desired effect. More

Waste

Joliet seeks hike in EPA radium limits

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(IL) Chicago Tribune – Joliet is pushing the Illinois Environmental Protection Agency to more than double the concentration of cancer-causing radium it’s allowed to dump onto farmland in the south suburbs, expanding the potential for deadly radon gas in these increasingly urban communities. Radium is a naturally occurring radioactive element abundant in deep-water wells in northern Illinois and throughout the Midwest. Cities such as Joliet that rely on these deep wells spend millions of dollars each year to remove radium from their drinking water. Some communities pay to dump radium in a landfill, but Joliet and others use a cheaper alternative, mixing it with waste material that is sold to farmers as fertilizer. More

Water

Aging sewage systems breed record bacteria in our waters

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(MI) Detroit Free Press – Metro Detroit’s outdated sewage systems regularly violate the law by dumping raw and partially treated human waste into rivers, streams and lakes that provide recreation and drinking water to more than 3 million people, a Free Press analysis of state records found. In the last two years, sewer systems in more than three dozen communities dumped a combined 80 billion gallons of raw and partially treated human waste into waterways. More