BILLINGS, Mont. (AP) — The Trump administration is seeking to fast-track mining projects and could offer grants and loans to help companies pay for equipment, administration officials said Thursday, as they offered details on a plan that critics said could spoil rivers and lakes in Minnesota, Idaho and elsewhere with mining pollution.
Great Lakes Now
https://www.greatlakesnow.org/2020/10/ap-trump-mining-minnesota/
Keep up with energy-related developments in the Great Lakes area with Great Lakes Now’s biweekly headline roundup.
In this edition: Power company plans to shutter coal plants in Illinois and Ohio; upgrading of East Lansing water treatment plan will save on energy costs; and Wisconsin receives poor grades for both energy and water infrastructure.
Great Lakes Now
https://www.greatlakesnow.org/2020/10/great-lakes-energy-illinois-coal-michigan-upgrade-wisconsin-infrastructure/
TRAVERSE CITY, Mich. (AP) — Gov. Gretchen Whitmer announced a $500 million plan Thursday to upgrade drinking water and wastewater infrastructure in Michigan that includes actions such as replacing lead service lines and removing chemical pollutants.
The initiative, dubbed MI Clean Water, calls for creating a pot of money from which local governments could apply for grants or loans to improve their water treatment systems.
Great Lakes Now
https://www.greatlakesnow.org/2020/10/ap-whitmer-michigan-500-million-water-infrastructure-plan/
Canada is home to the third largest renewable supply of fresh water in the world, spread across a vast swath of lakes, rivers, aquifers and glaciers. Fresh water is critical to the country’s economy and health, and a key part of the nation’s identity – paddling a canoe through northern waterways is a rite of passage, and more than 30% of Canadians live surrounded by water in the Great Lakes region.
Great Lakes Now
https://www.greatlakesnow.org/2020/10/canada-water-agency-government-consolidate-water-data-management/
Television audiences in Wisconsin can now tune in to the award-winning Great Lakes Now program on six more PBS stations.
Beginning Oct. 1, PBS Wisconsin will carry the series on The Wisconsin Channel broadcast on six signals: WHA-TV in Madison, WHLA-TV in La Crosse, WPNE-TV in Green Bay, WHRM-TV in Wausau, WHWC-TV in Menomonie-Eau Claire and WLEF-TV in Park Falls.
Great Lakes Now
https://www.greatlakesnow.org/2020/10/great-lakes-now-airing-pbs-wisconsin/
GRAND RAPIDS, Mich. (AP) — Drownings in Lake Michigan have reached record levels with at least 53 people dead so far this year, according to a water safety advocacy group.
The Great Lakes Surf Rescue Project, a nonprofit that tracks Great Lakes drownings, said that compares with 48 drownings in 2019 and 42 in 2018.
Great Lakes Now
https://www.greatlakesnow.org/2020/10/ap-lake-michigan-drownings-new-high-2020/
LANSING, Mich. (AP) — The Michigan Legislature on Tuesday finalized a bill that would lengthen the financing period of lake projects in the wake of flooding that damaged dams and drained lakes in the Midland area.
The legislation would extend, from 10 years to 40 years, the maximum maturity date of bonds issued to pay for inland lake-level control projects across the state.
Great Lakes Now
https://www.greatlakesnow.org/2020/09/ap-bill-lengthen-bonds-dam-repairs/
The Flint water crisis that made national and international headlines was a failure on many levels, according to University of Chicago Professor Sabina Shaikh.
Particularly, it was a public policy failure, Shaikh told Great Lakes Now in an interview, and the failure in Flint put a spotlight on environmental injustices.
Great Lakes Now
https://www.greatlakesnow.org/2020/09/policy-expert-advocating-elected-officials-safe-drinking-water/
An array of more than 80 marine-debris-turned-art works will be making another Great Lakes stop, adding a lake sturgeon sculpture when it’s installed at a Wisconsin site next year.
Made entirely of plastic trash, these larger-than-life figures have realistic designs. They come as part of the traveling exhibit, Washed Ashore, which aims to educate people about plastic pollution.
Great Lakes Now
https://www.greatlakesnow.org/2020/09/trash-fish-marine-debris-sculptures-great-lakes-aquariums-museums/
TRAVERSE CITY, Mich. (AP) — Enbridge’s plans for drilling an oil pipeline tunnel beneath a channel linking two of the Great Lakes do not meet industry standards and pose significant hazards to workers and the environment, experts who reviewed project documents on behalf of opposition groups told The Associated Press.
Great Lakes Now
https://www.greatlakesnow.org/2020/09/ap-opposition-criticizes-enbridge-plans-line-5-tunnel/
By Lester Graham, Michigan Radio
The Canadian pipeline company Enbridge Energy has been eager to show news media its new Enbridge Straits Maritime Operations Center in Mackinaw City. Its purpose is to try to prevent another anchor strike or other damage to Line 5, the dual pipelines carrying oil and natural gas liquids.
Great Lakes Now
https://www.greatlakesnow.org/2020/09/enbridge-inspects-freighters-anchor-strike-line-5/
Sandy Wynn-Stelt, a resident of Belmont, Michigan, known for her fight against Wolverine World Wide and PFAS, earned the 2020 Citizen Excellence in Community Involvement Award from the U.S. EPA.
Wynn-Stelt is featured in Great Lakes Now’s documentary, “The Forever Chemicals,” which brought audiences the story of her journey as she discovered the extent of the PFAS contamination in her private well and in her community.
Great Lakes Now
https://www.greatlakesnow.org/2020/09/citizen-excellence-sandy-wynn-stelt-receives-epa-award-for-efforts-to-combat-pfas/
By Jane Johnston, Circle of Blue
ALMA — Murray Borrello, wearing khakis and a loose-fitting brown button-up, walked down a backroad during the summer of 2019 listening to the sounds of the woods. Water from the Pine River flowed slowly beneath him as he looked out over a bridge.
Great Lakes Now
https://www.greatlakesnow.org/2020/09/michigan-county-cafos-agriculture-water-pollution/
By Kimberly M. S. Cartier, Eos
This story originally appeared in Eos and is republished here as part of Covering Climate Now, a global journalism collaboration strengthening coverage of the climate story.
As Chicago’s industries and population boomed in the late 1800s, city officials decided to reverse the course of the Chicago River so that it flowed away from Lake Michigan.
Great Lakes Now
https://www.greatlakesnow.org/2020/09/chicago-wetlands-shrank-40-20th-century/
By Mark Hertsgaard, The Nation
This story originally appeared in The Nation and is republished here as part of Covering Climate Now, a global journalism collaboration strengthening coverage of the climate story.
On Monday, The Nation and other Covering Climate Now partners held a “First-Time Voter Youth Day” to highlight the voices of the generation most affected by climate change as we launch a week of joint coverage of Climate Politics 2020.
Great Lakes Now
https://www.greatlakesnow.org/2020/09/climate-youth-2020-election-trump/
By Jacob Wallace, The Nation
This story originally appeared in The Nation and is republished here as part of Covering Climate Now, a global journalism collaboration strengthening coverage of the climate story.
In the speech she gave at the People’s Climate March in Washington in 2017, Jansikwe Medina-Tayac, then 15, told a crowd of thousands, “This [climate change] is not just an environmental issue.
Great Lakes Now
https://www.greatlakesnow.org/2020/09/election-2020-youth-vote-prioritize-climate-change/
YPSILANTI, Mich. (AP) — Eastern Michigan University will test campus wastewater for the COVID-19 virus and other signs of infectious diseases.
The testing, part of the school’s return-to-campus plan, is intended to track the presence of the coronavirus in wastewater flowing from residence halls and apartment complexes.
The monitoring might provide early detection of asymptomatic cases of the virus, according to the school.
Great Lakes Now
https://www.greatlakesnow.org/2020/09/ap-emu-campus-wastewater-covid-19/
TRAVERSE CITY, Mich. (AP) — Gray wolves that were taken to Michigan’s Isle Royale National Park to rebuild its nearly extinct population are forming social groups, staking out territory and apparently mating — promising signs despite heavy losses from natural causes and deadly fights, scientists said Monday.
Great Lakes Now
https://www.greatlakesnow.org/2020/09/isle-royale-wolves-moose-herd/
It’s convenient to think of fixing a problem and it’s done. But that doesn’t apply to the long-neglected legacy polluted sites in the Great Lakes region.
In simple terms we think of a cleanup as removal of something that, left unattended, will become a nuisance or a problem.
Great Lakes Now
https://www.greatlakesnow.org/2020/09/toxic-great-lakes-sites-capping-dredging/
Keep up with energy-related developments in the Great Lakes area with Great Lakes Now’s biweekly headline roundup.
In this edition: Wisconsin Public Service Commission extends utility shutoff moratorium, ruling that could undo Lake Erie wind farm project stands, and PolyMet copper-nickel mine gets critical legal win in Minnesota.
Great Lakes Now
https://www.greatlakesnow.org/2020/09/great-lakes-energy-mining-utility-line-5-lake-erie/
When Great Lakes Now Host Ward Detwiler isn’t introducing PBS audiences to the joys and troubles of the Great Lakes on our monthly program, he’s busy running a software company that’s revolutionizing MRI technology.
That work recently landed him on DBusiness Magazine‘s 2020 “30 in Their Thirties” list.
Great Lakes Now
https://www.greatlakesnow.org/2020/09/dbusiness-crains-list-ward-detwiler/
MADISON, Wis. (AP) — State environmental and health officials warned people Tuesday to avoid eating the livers of deer harvested around the Marinette area to avoid exposure to PFAS chemicals.
PFAS are man-made chemicals that research suggests can cause a range of health problems in humans. The chemicals have been used for decades in a range of products, including nonstick cookware, fast-food wrappers and firefighting foam.
Great Lakes Now
https://www.greatlakesnow.org/2020/09/ap-dnr-pfas-deer-livers-wisconsin-marinette/
By Lynne Peeples, Ensia, through the Institute for Nonprofit News network
This story is the first in a nine-month investigation of drinking water contamination across the U.S. The series is supported by funding from the Park Foundation and Water Foundation.
Once a week, Florencia Ramos makes a special trip to the R–N Market in Lindsay, California.
Great Lakes Now
https://www.greatlakesnow.org/2020/09/drinking-unsafe-water-contaminants-solutions/
Sea lamprey control in the Great Lakes has been a success.
Compared to the 1950s, 90% fewer of the toothy, invasive, eel-like parasite are spawning.
Control efforts have been so successful that some researchers now suggest a more permanent solution: complete eradication of the pest from the Great Lakes.
Great Lakes Now
https://www.greatlakesnow.org/2020/09/sea-lamprey-invasive-species-research-eradication-great-lakes/
EDENVILLE, Mich. (AP) — Residents who lost their lakes when dams collapsed in mid-Michigan could be getting expensive long-term bills to restore them.
People near Wixom and Sanford lakes in Midland and Gladwin counties could pay thousands of dollars per year for 40 years, if that duration is allowed by the state, the Four Lakes Task Force said Thursday during an online meeting.
Great Lakes Now
https://www.greatlakesnow.org/2020/09/ap-residents-midland-dams-paying-for-years/
The teenagers and scientists searching for the 2017 meteorite in Lake Michigan found more than they had been looking for, representatives from the team reported yesterday.
In a live update on the Adler Planetarium’s YouTube channel, students and researchers shared two major finds from The Aquarius Project’s years-long attempt to find the meteorite: a sample that could be from that meteorite and a sample from a meteorite much, much older.
Great Lakes Now
https://www.greatlakesnow.org/2020/09/aquarius-project-findings-update-meteorite-fragments-lake-michigan/
By Elena Bruess, Circle of Blue
At the shoreline, between lake and land, Melissa Wiatrolik reflects on those who were here before Michigan became Michigan. She had been raised in a community that honored the dead, that understood that their ancestors were always present. As a child, she had watched her own family clean the gravestones of those before her.
Great Lakes Now
https://www.greatlakesnow.org/2020/09/michigan-rising-lake-levels-sacred-ground/
The Toledo Zoo’s popular lake sturgeon stocking event won’t happen this year, though a pause in the program – thanks to the international COVID-19 pandemic – won’t hurt the project.
“In a nutshell, our partners out of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service in Alpena, Michigan, and Genoa, Wisconsin, are the ones who collect the eggs,” explained Kent Bekker, director of conservation at the zoo.
Great Lakes Now
https://www.greatlakesnow.org/2020/09/sturgeon-stocking-covid-19-release-program/
Three years after a meteorite crashed into Lake Michigan, the Adler Planetarium is giving a live virtual update on the search to find it.
Join at 1 p.m. ET/noon CT on Thursday, Sept. 10. Watch here:
In February 2017, a meteorite lit up the night sky before crashing into Lake Michigan off the Wisconsin shoreline.
Great Lakes Now
https://www.greatlakesnow.org/2020/09/planetarium-update-lake-michigan-meteorite/
By Enrique Saenz, Indiana Environmental Reporter
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s regional office in the Midwest is refuting the findings of an internal investigation that found that a lack of record-keeping controls and standard operating procedures could be preventing it from fulfilling federal record-keeping responsibilities.
The EPA’s Office of Inspector General found that Region 5, which oversees EPA activities in Indiana and five other states, could not verify whether employees were using the agency’s official record-keeping system, preserving records for litigation holds and agency use, or knew how to report and investigate a suspected loss of records.
Great Lakes Now
https://www.greatlakesnow.org/2020/09/epa-region-5-internal-watchdog-report-record-keeping/
For the second time in two years Chicago-based Environmental Law & Policy Center appears to have forced the Ohio Environmental Protection Agency’s hand in seeking solutions to Lake Erie’s ongoing nutrients pollution problem.
In U.S Northern District of Ohio Court hearings on July 17 and July 30, ELPC attorneys sought a summary judgement requiring the U.S.
Great Lakes Now
https://www.greatlakesnow.org/2020/09/total-maximum-daily-load-court-case-ohio-epa-nutrients-lake-erie/
LANSING, Mich. (AP) — An invasive aquatic plant — first detected in southeastern Michigan in 1996 — has been found in four inland lakes in Washtenaw and Jackson counties.
The presence of European frogbit has been confirmed within the Waterloo Recreation Area, according to Michigan’s Department of Environment, Great Lakes, and Energy.
Great Lakes Now
https://www.greatlakesnow.org/2020/09/ap-frogbit-invasive-aquatic-plant-michigan-inland-lakes/
Detroit water rights advocate Monica Lewis-Patrick has a few questions for presidential candidates incumbent Donald Trump and former Vice President Joe Biden.
“What’s your water policy? What will you do to protect our drinking water,” Lewis-Patrick asked in a July Healing Our Waters Coalition press release that asked the candidates to support a Great Lakes water platform.
Great Lakes Now
https://www.greatlakesnow.org/2020/09/2020-candidates-water-quality-great-lakes-states/
Great Lakes Moment is a monthly column written by Great Lakes Now Contributor John Hartig. Publishing the author’s views and assertions does not represent endorsement by Great Lakes Now or Detroit Public Television.
Forty years after Uniroyal shut down in Detroit, contaminated sediment cleanup is starting in the Detroit River off this former industrial site.
Great Lakes Now
https://www.greatlakesnow.org/2020/09/great-lakes-moment-uniroyal-contaminated-sediment-cleanup/
Generations of a family led by a strong patriarch clash over the future of a treasured Canadian vacation home. The local Ojibwe chief threatens to claim the land.
And a pristine but foreboding lake north of Lake Huron is an omnipresent part of the drama.
That’s the setting for The Best Part of Us, the debut novel by former international Great Lakes executive, Sally Cole-Misch.
Great Lakes Now
https://www.greatlakesnow.org/2020/09/great-lakes-author-conflict-culture-novel/
Josh Otten reached down and pulled two turtles from the bow compartment of his kayak. One was the size of a dinner plate; the other was barely the size of a silver dollar pancake. Both were northern map turtles, the most common species of turtle in the Kalamazoo River watershed, according to Otten who played a key role in the rescue and rehabilitation of more than 2,000 turtles in 2010 following the Kalamazoo River oil spill.
Great Lakes Now
https://www.greatlakesnow.org/2020/09/turtle-recovery-kalamazoo-river-enbridge-oil-spill/
Keep up with energy-related developments in the Great Lakes area with Great Lakes Now’s biweekly headline roundup.
In this edition: Michigan’s Bay County to lose millions in tax revenue with closure of coal plant; a COVID-19 study looking at energy crises cites rural areas and tribal nations in Michigan; and Ohio legislators begin the repeal process for controversial House Bill 6.
Great Lakes Now
https://www.greatlakesnow.org/2020/09/great-lakes-energy-ohio-nuclear-michigan-coal-crisis/
By Timberly Ferree, Indiana Environmental Reporter
Indiana University and Purdue University have each been awarded $1.6 million Environmental Protection Agency research grants to better understand the potential impacts of per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances on water quality and availability in rural communities and agricultural operations across the United States.
Great Lakes Now
https://www.greatlakesnow.org/2020/09/indiana-universities-pfas-impact-water-quality/
LANSING, Mich. (AP) — Michigan lawmakers on Tuesday began approving a budget bill that would authorize the federal government’s supplemental $300-a-week unemployment benefit during the coronavirus pandemic and provide $6 million in state funding for costs related to devastating flooding in the Midland area.
Great Lakes Now
https://www.greatlakesnow.org/2020/09/ap-michigan-house-jobless-benefits-flood-costs/
BILLINGS, Mont. (AP) — The Trump administration on Monday finalized its weakening of an Obama-era rule aimed at reducing polluted wastewater from coal-burning power plants that has contaminated streams, lakes and underground aquifers
The change will allow utilities to use cheaper technologies and take longer to comply with pollution reduction guidelines that are less stringent than what the agency originally adopted in 2015.
Great Lakes Now
https://www.greatlakesnow.org/2020/09/ap-trump-administration-coal-plant-pollution-rollback/
By Judith Lavoie, The Narwhal
This story originally appeared in The Narwhal and is republished here as part of Covering Climate Now, a global journalism collaboration strengthening coverage of the climate story.
New global industry standards for dealing with mine waste are not enforceable, fail to set measurable standards and will not protect communities, workers or the environment from disasters such as the 2014 Mount Polley spill or the deadly 2019 Brumadinho dam failure in Brazil, says an international group of scientists, community organizations and non-profits.
Great Lakes Now
https://www.greatlakesnow.org/2020/09/new-global-standards-mine-waste-dam-failures-critics/
Alongside the illnesses, deaths and closures caused by COVID-19, the threat of climate change still hangs over communities across the Great Lakes region and around the world. And the people and organizations fighting against climate change and for environmental justice have found themselves caught between these two threats to public health.
Great Lakes Now
https://www.greatlakesnow.org/2020/08/intersecting-crises-climate-change-justice-covid-19/
The city of Waukesha, Wisconsin, was recently awarded a $137.1 million dollar loan from the federal government for its construction project to switch the city’s municipal water source to Lake Michigan. Andrew Wheeler, administrator of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, announced the loan on August 12 in Waukesha alongside Mayor Shawn Reilly.
Great Lakes Now
https://www.greatlakesnow.org/2020/08/lake-michigan-pipeline-waukesha-water-supply-project/
Just getting to and from away basketball games can be a challenge.
Great Lakes Now followed four teams at the Great Lakes Islands Basketball Tournament last year. See the multimodal transportation it takes to get them to the hard court:
But will the 2020 tournament happen?
Great Lakes Now
https://www.greatlakesnow.org/2020/08/travel-great-lakes-island-schools-games/
When the Put-In-Bay School girls and boys basketball teams played this past season, it was without one of their biggest fans.
A few months earlier, the community’s beloved announcer, Patrick Myers, took his own life.
“He’s the reason that we play so hard,” said Senior Hannah Lentz, who told Great Lakes Now about him during the second annual Great Lakes Islands Basketball Tournament, a competition between four small island schools.
Great Lakes Now
https://www.greatlakesnow.org/2020/08/put-in-bay-school-basketball-team-beloved-announcer/
Thousands of oil and gas operations, government facilities and other sites won permission to stop monitoring for hazardous emissions or otherwise bypass rules intended to protect health and the environment because of the coronavirus outbreak, The Associated Press has found.
Great Lakes Now
https://www.greatlakesnow.org/2020/08/ap-thousands-allowed-bypass-environmental-rules-pandemic/
In her first regional appearance after taking office in January 2019, Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer made it clear that Michigan would take a leadership role on Great Lakes issues.
“Michigan has to lead on Great Lakes issues,” Whitmer told Great Lakes Now after speaking to fellow Great Lakes governors and Canadian premiers and the broader Great Lakes community in Milwaukee.
Great Lakes Now
https://www.greatlakesnow.org/2020/08/michigan-state-great-lakes-drinking-water-quality/
TRAVERSE CITY, Mich. (AP) — Keeping a 64-year-old oil pipeline in operation by running one portion through a proposed Great Lakes tunnel would safeguard the economy and energy supplies, supporters said Monday, while opponents described the project as an unnecessary risk that would contribute to global warming.
Great Lakes Now
https://www.greatlakesnow.org/2020/08/ap-pipeline-tunnel-supporters-foes-clash-michigan-panel/
The latest episode of Great Lakes Now takes a trip to Chicago to learn all about the Eastland tragedy – one that isn’t well known, despite its big impact.
On July 24, 1915, a steamship capsized in the Chicago River, and 844 people drowned.
A documentary about the tragedy, “Eastland: The Shipwreck That Shook America,” is airing on PBS stations around the country.
Great Lakes Now
https://www.greatlakesnow.org/2020/08/eastland-documentary-filmmakers-behind-the-scenes/
Historic photos, newly discovered film reels, archival accounts from survivors and stories from their descendants are all part of the new documentary “Eastland: The Shipwreck That Shook America.”
The steamship capsized on the Chicago River as hundreds of passengers boarded. Their destination: a day trip to Michigan City, Indiana, just across the southern end of Lake Michigan.
Great Lakes Now
https://www.greatlakesnow.org/2020/08/chicago-eastland-disaster-great-lakes-tragedy-storymap/
