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Tuesday, January 01, 2008
Environment - How much pollution do Indiana facilities discharge into Lake Michigan each year?
The Sunday before Christmas (Dec. 23rd) the Gary Post-Tribune published a series of stories by their environmental reporter, Gitte Lasby, seeking to answer the question of "How much pollution do Indiana facilities discharge into Lake Michigan each year?" The lead story, headed "Progress, but not enough," reports in part:
The Clean Water Act set out to "virtually eliminate" discharges to U.S. waterways by 1985. But a Post-Tribune analysis shows Indiana's major facilities discharged more than 378 million pounds of pollutants into Lake Michigan and its tributaries in just one year.Here are links to the accompanying stories:Dumping of nearly all pollutants discharged by Indiana's 33 major polluters has fallen dramatically since 1979. The Clean Water Act has made a difference.
Dumping of nearly all pollutants discharged by Indiana's 33 major polluters has fallen dramatically since 1979. The Clean Water Act has made a difference.
But it hasn't reached its goal of zero discharges, or come near it. * * *
Releases of two substances have increased since then in Lake Michigan. Facilities dumped more than 10 times as much hexavalent chromium -- a human carcinogen -- than 26 years earlier. It would take 1.15 trillion gallons of water to dilute that much hexavalent chromium -- 1,918 pounds -- to safe drinking levels. Lake Michigan, at 1.3 quadrillion gallons, has 1,130 times that much water.
They also unloaded more than 227 million pounds of dissolved solids, such as salt. That's more than 15 times the amount released in 1979. * * *
No new deadline has been set to reach the goal of no discharges. But with the public firestorm this summer over the wastewater permit for BP Whiting and increased public interest in wastewater permits in general, environmentalists say the Clean Water Act is getting new scrutiny.
The last major overhaul was 20 years ago and it may be time for a new generation of the act, Cameron Davis, president of the Alliance for the Great Lakes, said.
"As I think the BP case told us, some people have lost sight of the fact that the Clean Water Act is supposed to get us to zero over time. And that needs to continue to be our goal. There's a lot of talk about reducing or eliminating our carbon footprints. We need to be doing the same to reduce our water footprint," Davis said.
Botts said last time public interest was this high was when pollution in the Cuyahoga River in Ohio caught on fire in 1969. The incident spurred an avalanche of pollution control activities, which resulted in the Clean Water Act.
"Progress, whether it's enough, remains to be seen. How it (the Clean Water Act) deals with growth, and still reducing pollution as you go, that's a bigger question for me," Botts said.
"The goal was to eliminate pollution. That's the direction we should continue to go. Recognize that we have made progress, but it's not enough."
The numbers: "Pounds discharged into Lake Michigan and tributaries" is available here."How the P-T got the story" is available here.
"Why should you care about the pollutants?" is available here.
"10 things you can do to help the lake" is available here.
Posted by Marcia Oddi on January 1, 2008 04:12 PM
Posted to Environment