After a two-month delay, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers has announced plans to start dredging the South Haven Harbor in South Haven, Michigan this month. Sampling results confirm the proposed outer harbor dredge material is suitable and 18,000 cubic yards of material will be placed as nourishment material south of South Beach. Read the full story by South Haven Tribune.
Great Lakes Commission
https://www.glc.org/dailynews/20220829-dredge
A boil-water advisory could last up to two weeks for more than 130,000 people in southeastern Michigan as crews repair a water pipe break affecting 23 communities. The break was discovered Saturday on a critical pipe in St. Clair County, which carries treated water from Lake Huron and is the largest in the Great Lakes Water Authority system. Read the full story by The Associated Press.
Great Lakes Commission
https://www.glc.org/dailynews/20220817-water-advisory
For the first time in more than 70 years, two pairs of Great Lakes piping plovers have nested and successfully fledged five chicks from Gull Point at Presque Isle State Park in Erie, Pennsylvania. Read the full story by WJET-TV – Erie, PA.
Great Lakes Commission
https://www.glc.org/dailynews/20220817-piping-plover
Shimmy, a Blanding’s turtle, had been tracked numerous times by biologists on the north shore of Lake Erie, who remarked on his “odd characteristics”: two missing feet, at the front left and rear right. So, when Shimmy, whose species is classified as “threatened” in Ontario, showed up more than 100 kilometres at the Royal Botanical Gardens in Burlington, Ontario, how he managed to traverse roads, towns and farmland presented a mystery. Read the full story by CBC News.
Great Lakes Commission
https://www.glc.org/dailynews/20220817-turtle
Officials for the City of Hamilton announced plans to start dredging operations to remove hazardous sediment from Chedoke Creek, which received 24 billion liters of sewage from a combined sewer overflow between 2014 and 2018. The spill originated where Chedoke Creek connects with Lake Ontario at Princess Point. Read the full story by CBC News.
Great Lakes Commission
https://www.glc.org/dailynews/20220817-dredging
A pair of bright orange unmanned watercraft created by the California-based company Saildrone, will be plying the waters of western Lake Superior for the next month as part of a fish population study for the United States Geological Survey. Read the full story by MLive.
Great Lakes Commission
https://www.glc.org/dailynews/20220817-saildrone
On the weekend of July 29, Tribar Manufacturing in Wixom, Michigan, released hexavalent chromium into the Wixom Sewage Treatment Facility, which discharges into the Huron River system. After almost two weeks, the Michigan Department of Health and Human Services has lifted its no-contact recommendation on parts of the Huron River following the chemical spill. Read the full story by Michigan Advance.
Great Lakes Commission
https://www.glc.org/dailynews/20220817-chromium-spill
In an update to a harmful algal bloom detection in Lake Erie, Michigan’s Monroe County has lifted a whole-body contact advisory for Sterling State Park but retained the advisory at Luna Pier Beach, both of which border Lake Erie. The public is advised to keep aware of changing conditions and to avoid water activities in areas where the advisory remains. Read the full story by The Monroe News.
Great Lakes Commission
https://www.glc.org/dailynews/20220817-algae
Advocates for the Mississippi River are hoping that a proposed federal funding program, modeled after an effort to clean up the Great Lakes, could change the trajectory of the river’s increasing flood frequency, address invasive species, pollution, and the dead zone where the Mississippi empties into the Gulf of Mexico. Read the full story by Milwaukee Journal Sentinel.
Great Lakes Commission
https://www.glc.org/dailynews/20220725-mississippi
Members of a hunting and fishing advocacy group want a federal judge to make them an official party to negotiations between the state and five Michigan tribes over treaty-protected fishing rights. Read the full story by Mlive.com.
Great Lakes Commission
https://www.glc.org/dailynews/20220725-fishing
The Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources is the lead state agency for Enbridge’s Line 3 pipeline, permitting the $450 million project and in December, released a draft environmental review of the company’s plan. Now, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency says the state’s review failed to fully analyze the ways in which the project could harm the environment, as well as tribal resources and treaty rights. Read the full story by Wisconsin Public Radio.
Great Lakes Commission
https://www.glc.org/dailynews/20220725-line-3
Members of the Georgian Bay Great Lakes Foundation addressed the council of Tiny Township, Ontario at the recent committee of the whole meeting, presenting an update on Georgian Bay issues including water levels and water quality, and asking the township for a letter of support for funding from the federal government. Read the full story by BarrieToday.
Great Lakes Commission
https://www.glc.org/dailynews/20220725-georgian-bay
A Canadian man on a quest to raise awareness and money for mental health through crossing all five Great Lakes by paddleboard this summer, is ready for his next conquest. Mike Shoreman, who this summer has crossed Lake Erie, Lake Huron and Lake Superior by paddleboard, is planning on crossing Lake Michigan, starting on Tuesday night and overnight into Wednesday. Read the full story by WJXT-TV – Jacksonville, FL.
Great Lakes Commission
https://www.glc.org/dailynews/20220725-paddleboard
The 2022 algal bloom is expected to have a low severity index of 3.5, according to the final forecast from the National Atmospheric and Oceanic Administration released June 30. This will be the fourth year out of the past seven that the algal bloom will be rated less than 4 on a scale of 1 (mild) to 10 (severe). Read the full story by Ohio’s Country Journal.
Great Lakes Commission
https://www.glc.org/dailynews/20220725-algae
The River Raisin contributes phosphorus and drains into Lake Erie. Now, Michigan farmers are talking about what can be done. Read the full story by Michigan Public Radio.
Great Lakes Commission
https://www.glc.org/dailynews/20220725-phosphorus
Tempers are flaring on a stretch of Southwestern Ontario’s Lake Huron shore amid complaints of trespassing and bullying as frustrated cottage owners clash with beachgoers over access to the sand and water on their private property. Read the full story by The London Free Press.
Great Lakes Commission
https://www.glc.org/dailynews/20220725-beach
The future Lakeview Village will see 8,000 residential units constructed on 177 acres of Mississauga, Ontario’s Lake Ontario coastline. A district energy system could drastically reduce the carbon footprint of these units and their future residents utilizing the adjacent waste water treatment plant. Read the full story by The Pointer.
Great Lakes Commission
https://www.glc.org/dailynews/20220725-energy
Residents of Aitkin County, Minnesota have concerns with proposed sulfide mining in the state near abundant wetlands and the headwaters of the Mississippi River and St. Croix watershed, and with many nearby communities including Minneapolis, St. Paul, and Duluth there is concern these communities could eventually be affected by acid drainage among other issues. Read the full story by Duluth News-Tribune.
Great Lakes Commission
https://www.glc.org/dailynews/20220725-sulfide
A parade and ceremony will take place today in Thunder Bay, Ontario in recognition of 60 years of Canadian Coast Guard service. The event will celebrate the critical contribution and role of the Canadian Coast Guard in maintaining and policing the waterways of the Great Lakes – St. Lawrence Seaway System since 1962. Read the full story by Lake Superior News.
Great Lakes Commission
https://www.glc.org/dailynews/20220718-coast-guard
Celebrated every year on the third Sunday in July, Lake Superior Day is a day to bask in the glory of the largest of the Great Lakes. Read the full story by WDIC-TV – Detroit, MI.
Great Lakes Commission
https://www.glc.org/dailynews/20220718-lake-superior
Dr. David Philipp, a professor at the University of Illinois and a Director of the Fisheries Conservation Foundation has been studying the bass populations in eastern Ontario lakes for decades. He argues that though the bass season opened June 18 this year, males were still guarding their broods contributing to increased nest predation. Read the full story by Smiths Falls Record News.
Great Lakes Commission
https://www.glc.org/dailynews/20220718-fish-spawning
Even though this is the first year for the Viking’s cruise ships on the Great Lakes, commercial cruising has been slowly expanding in the lakes the past decade, with the exception of the initial pandemic years. 2022 may be setting records, with nine cruise ships setting sail this season, four of them new ships making their inaugural trips through the locks and into the lakes. Read the full story by Chicago Tribune.
Great Lakes Commission
https://www.glc.org/dailynews/20220718-cruise-ship
The state of Michigan may no longer plant brown trout in Lake Huron in Northeast Michigan, as efforts to release them yielded only about 2% survival. Instead, the Michigan Department of Natural Resources is planning to release brown trout in other areas where they believe the survival rate is higher. Read the full story by The Alpena News.
Great Lakes Commission
https://www.glc.org/dailynews/20220718-brown-trout
Kevin Ailes began researching the wreck of the Milwaukie, a ship that went down in a fierce winter storm near Saugatuck in November of 1842. It’s one of the earliest known shipwrecks along the West Michigan lakeshore. Read the full story by UpNorthLive.com.
Great Lakes Commission
https://www.glc.org/dailynews/20220718-shipwreck
Ontario’s electricity system is searching for more power producers as demand rises and a major nuclear plant nears retirement, a process likely to secure more natural gas generation while the government seeks to end reliance on it. It means that for at least the next two decades, greenhouse gas emissions from the electricity sector are set to increase. Read the full story by The Canadian Press.
Great Lakes Commission
https://www.glc.org/dailynews/20220718-energy-nuclear
The former Marmoraton iron mine in Northland, Ontario is being considered for a pumped energy storage site potentially powering 1,000 homes through the stored hydropower, but financial concerns remain. Read the full story by The Narwhal.
Great Lakes Commission
https://www.glc.org/dailynews/20220718-energy-pump
On Saturday July 16th, the 98th Bayview Mackinac Race took place as more than 170 sailboats headed out onto Lake Huron. Read the full story by Times Herald.
Great Lakes Commission
https://www.glc.org/dailynews/20220718-sailboat-race
The town of Euclid, OH located about 15 minutes northeast of Cleveland, has had fish wash up on their shoreline over the past week. View the full story by WOIO-TV – Euclid, OH.
Great Lakes Commission
https://www.glc.org/dailynews/20220718-dead-fish
In 2016, the accepted limit for PFOA – one of several PFAS chemicals – in drinking water was at 70 parts per trillion. Now, the EPA has lowered that number to .004 parts per trillion. This means that PFOA is 75,000 times more toxic than previously thought. Read the full story by WKAR Public Media.
Great Lakes Commission
https://www.glc.org/dailynews/20220620-pfas
Community concerns of Lake Michigan contamination from a Waukegan power plant’s recently shuttered coal-fired units heightened last week after an environmental study, released by Chicago’s Environmental Law and Policy Center, identified the facility as a potential flood risk due to climate-related lake level changes. Read the full story by Daily Herald.
Great Lakes Commission
https://www.glc.org/dailynews/20220620-coal
Negotiators are updating a 2000 consent decree, a legal settlement that spells out where and how much lake whitefish and lake trout can be harvested by recreational, state-licensed and Native American commercial fishers in the Great Lakes. The invasion of zebra and quagga mussel invasions, among other changes, to the Great Lakes have caused ecological disruption that sets the scene for deciding how to manage the lakes in the future. Read the full story by Great Lakes Echo.
Great Lakes Commission
https://www.glc.org/dailynews/20220620-fish-harvest
Today (June 20th) marks the 10-year anniversary of the Duluth flood, more than 10 inches of rain fell in 24 hours and raging waters overcame the city’s hillside streams in its most devastating flood in history. Read the full story by The Star Tribune.
Great Lakes Commission
https://www.glc.org/dailynews/20220620-duluth-flood
New court documents in the fight over Line 5 show that an energy industry consultant hired by Enbridge estimates shutting down the pipeline that runs under the Straits of Mackinac would have a minimal impact on fuel prices. According to the report prices for gasoline, jet fuel and diesel would rise by an estimated 0.5 cents per gallon, however the impact in Ontario would be far greater, closer to 5 cents per gallon. Read the full story by WOOD-TV – Grand Rapids, MI.
Great Lakes Commission
https://www.glc.org/dailynews/20220620-line5
Researchers at Lake Superior State University in Sault Ste. Marie, Michigan, are studying clumps of the invasive species didymo or “rock snot” algae to learn more about its lifecycle and impacts. Didymo first appeared in the St. Mary’s River in 2015. Read the full story by MLive.
Great Lakes Commission
https://www.glc.org/dailynews/20220620-didymo
The invasive plant, water chestnut, has been found a home below the village of Heuvelton’s dam on the Oswegatchie River in New York State, infesting hundreds of acres of bay and river. Volunteer efforts will continue this year to remove the invasive plant. Read the full story by Watertown Daily Town.
Great Lakes Commission
https://www.glc.org/dailynews/20220620-invasive-plant
“Swim Shady,” a juvenile sturgeon, was released into the Detroit River June 3 after spending the school year in Michigan’s Gibraltar School District. The release, is the culmination of a St. Clair-Detroit River Sturgeon for Tomorrow project, which is designed to build awareness and appreciation for the environment. Read the full story by The News-Herald.
Great Lakes Commission
https://www.glc.org/dailynews/20220620-sturgeon
Shipments of iron ore from U.S. Great Lakes ports totaled 4.4 million tons in May — a decrease of 20.4% compared to the same month a year ago, and 21.9% below the month’s five-year average, according to the Ohio-based Lake Carriers’ Association last week. Read the full story by the Duluth News Tribune.
Great Lakes Commission
https://www.glc.org/dailynews/20220620-shipping
Brookfield Renewable U.S. plans to construct a 2,050-foot long berm to protect its Steel Winds II facility from damage during storms along Lake Erie. Fall and winter storms have caused erosion events impacting access and causing turbine shutdowns for remediation. Read the full story by The Buffalo News.
Great Lakes Commission
https://www.glc.org/dailynews/20220620-wind
A report by Chicago’s Environmental Law and Policy Center, focuses on toxic hazards in the four states bordering Lake Michigan but also notes that densely populated neighborhoods in Chicago could face potentially devastating flooding if weather patterns continue. Large parts of those areas may face more severe flooding, as much as a half-mile inland, and pose threat to lakefront superfund sites. Read the full story by Chicago Sun-Times.
Great Lakes Commission
https://www.glc.org/dailynews/20220615-climate-impacts
Environmental advocates argue the gear oil spill last week in St. Marys River connecting Lakes Superior and Huron amounts to a small taste of the potential ecological catastrophe that could strike the heart of the Great Lakes should a controversial underwater petrochemical pipeline rupture. Read the full story by MLive.
Great Lakes Commission
https://www.glc.org/dailynews/20220615-oil-spill
In six months, Detroit’s temporary ban on water shut-offs runs out, and residents with past-due bills will once again be at risk of losing access to water. More than 60,000 city households have delinquent water bills. Read the full story by Detroit Free Press and Bridge Detroit.
Great Lakes Commission
https://www.glc.org/dailynews/20220615-water-shut-offs
Wisconsin Republicans will allow regulations Democratic Gov. Tony Evers’ administration developed to control pollution from a group of chemicals known as PFAS to take effect. Regulations that are being finalized include a 70 parts per trillion standard for drinking water and an 8 ppt standard for most surface waters that can support fish, while leaving well water unregulated. Read the full story by Great Lakes Now.
Great Lakes Commission
https://www.glc.org/dailynews/20220615-pfas-standards
Mike Shoreman, a passionate advocate for mental health after suddenly losing his mobility in 2018, has crossed Lake Erie this summer and set his sights on crossing all five Great Lakes. Shoreman is set to finish his crossing of Lake Huron next and would become the first person with a disability to paddleboard across Lake Huron. Read the full story by The Toronto Star.
Great Lakes Commission
https://www.glc.org/dailynews/20220615-great-lakes-crossing
A large alewife die-off washed up on the beach along the state of Michigan’s Lake Michigan shoreline. While it may be an unpleasant sight, die offs are a sign the Lake Michigan salmon fishery is in good shape and benefitting juvenile fish. Read the full story by Manistee News Advocate.
Great Lakes Commission
https://www.glc.org/dailynews/20220615-alewives
The Nature Conservancy is wrapping up restoration of Erie Marsh Preserve set to be completed in 2023. The project, which began in 2011, reconnected the marsh to Lake Erie making roughly 250 acres of potential habitat available to fish for spawning and foraging. Read the full story by The Monroe Evening News.
Great Lakes Commission
https://www.glc.org/dailynews/20220615-erie-preserve
Staff at the Little Traverse Bay Bands of Odawa Indians Natural Resources Department have been working since 2013 to revitalize vulnerable fish species in the 1836 treaty territory. Read the full story by Michigan Advance.
Great Lakes Commission
https://www.glc.org/dailynews/20220615-fish
Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources has started to release the findings of voluntary per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) testing of water utilities across the state, finding new contaminations. Read the full story by Milwaukee Journal Sentinel.
Great Lakes Commission
https://www.glc.org/dailynews/20220615-pfas-locations
In a recent, unofficial outlook of the Great Lakes water levels, the Army Corps of Engineers Detroit District forecasts that the Great Lakes water levels may continue to be above their long-term average for the following year should weather and ice cover conditions be similar to this past winter. Read the full story by Thumbwind.
Great Lakes Commission
https://www.glc.org/dailynews/20220615-lake-levels
The population of sea lampreys in the Great Lakes could increase significantly in the next year or two due to pandemic delayed mitigation, and it’s currently unclear how quickly the population can be culled back. Read the full story by WJET – Erie, PA.
Great Lakes Commission
https://www.glc.org/dailynews/20220606-lamprey
As Chicago battles erosion intensified by climate change on its 26 miles of public lakefront, officials are scrambling to find more money for repairs, scientists are tracking the disappearing sand and environmental groups are seeking ways to protect the fragile resource. Read the full story by The Chicago Tribune.
Great Lakes Commission
https://www.glc.org/dailynews/20220606-chicago-shoreline
