Ijc to Study Lake Superior Water Releases

An international watchdog group hopes to study the effect of water flowing out of Lake Superior on the rest of the Great Lakes. It is thought that by controlling water from Superior, scientists can better control damaging level fluctuations in the other lakes. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Mike Simonson has the story:

Transcript

An international watchdog group hopes to study the effect of water flowing out of Lake Superior on the rest of the Great Lakes. It is thought that by controlling water from Superior, scientists can better control damaging level fluctuations in the other lakes. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Mike Simonson has the story:

Record high lake levels in the mid-1980’s caused extensive erosion, and below normal levels the past three years have forced ships to carry less cargo, to avoid running aground. The International Joint Commission’s Frank Bevaqua says this begs the question: Is the flow of water out of Lake Superior being handled correctly?

“There’s also the communities along the shoreline that may be susceptible to flooding and erosion and the recreational use of the lakes, particularly by boaters. And then there’s the environmental impact, which is probably the area in which we have the least precision in terms of what we know.”

The IJC is asking Washington and Ottawa to pay for a three-year study of the effect water flowing out of Lake Superior has on the other Great Lakes.

For the Great Lakes Radio Consortium, I’m Mike Simonson.

Charting a Course for the ‘Big Muddy’

  • A recent National Academy of Sciences report on the Missouri River suggested some of the river's natural meanders and access to the flood plain be restored. It also suggested sections of the river be reviewed to see if barge traffic might be closed for parts of the year or permanently.

The National Academy of Sciences has issued a report that calls for the restoration of the longest river in the United States. That report says the government needs to stop studying problems along the Missouri River and – with the help of residents – do something about them. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Lester Graham has the story:

Transcript

The National Academy of Sciences has issued a report that calls for the restoration of the longest river in the United States. That report says the government needs to stop studying problems along the Missouri River and – with the help of residents – do something about them. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Lester Graham reports:

On the opposite bank from here, you can see the Big Muddy empty into the Mississippi River. I’m standing on the spot where Lewis and Clark and the Corps of Discovery spent the winter before starting their historic expedition up the Missouri, across the Rockies and to the Pacific coast. If Lewis and Clark could see the Missouri today, there’s little that they’d recognize at this end of the river. Over the years it’s been straightened, walled-in by levees and channelized. Its braided river system of meanders, backwaters and eddies, once alive with wildlife are – for the most part – gone.

Seventy years ago as the government began huge civil engineering projects; it expected the Missouri River to be a major transportation means of getting grain from the farm fields of Nebraska, Kansas, Iowa and Missouri to the markets. But as it’s turned out, almost all of the grain from those states is moved to market by truck or rail or in Missouri’s case on the Mississippi River. Only a tiny fraction less than one-half of one-percent of all the grain harvested in those states is moved by barge on the Missouri River.

According to the Army Corps of Engineers, barge traffic on the Missouri benefits the economy by saving about seven million dollars in transportation costs. But some years the Army Corps of Engineers spends that much maintaining the lower Missouri as a navigable river, and the taxpayers foot the bill.

The National Academy of Sciences – the NAS – was instructed to study the Missouri River and determine the best uses of the river and its flood plain. Stephen Gloss was the chair of the committee that wrote the final report. He says one thing’s certain; the condition of the Missouri River has been studied to death. Its problems are well documented.

“The people should understand the Missouri River ecosystem is in a significant state of decline. There’s been a lot of degradation of the ecological properties of the system. There’s ample scientific evidence to credibly demonstrate that and there doesn’t need to be any more research done to make that credible. The most important thing is to undertake some immediate action.”

The NAS report suggested that the people of the states along the Missouri River should start figuring out where some of the Missouri’s meanders could be replaced and where it could be allowed back into its old flood plain.

At a town hall meeting in Columbia, Missouri, three of the authors of the study, including Stephen Gloss, met recently with representatives of the barge industry, agriculture and government agencies along the Missouri River and with the public. A farmer from Oregon, Missouri, Lanny Meng, told the NAS committee members he’s heard this kind of talk for several years, and he didn’t much like it.

“When they talk about meanders of the Missouri channel and they talk about connectivity with the flood plain. And that flood plain’s my cornfield.”

“Well, I think that the flow change and the management change of the Missouri River’s gonna have a drastic negative affect on my farming practice, and my neighbor’s farming practice and my county. Things will change badly for our community?”

The farmers are not the only ones concerned about change on the Missouri River. The barge industry, which depends on keeping the water level artificially high and the channel deep doesn’t believe there’s enough water to keep the reservoirs full in the upper Missouri, make new diversions for wildlife backwaters and meanders, and keep the barges floating.

Chris Bescia is with the barge industry group Midwest Area River Coalition 2000, better known as MARC-2000.

“So, when the National Academy of Science report says that we want to have more cuts and alluvial deviations in the river, when they say that we want to re-connect the flood plain, when they say all these things, that’s essentially taking out the channel training structures that are designed to maintain a nine foot channel.”

Which the barges need to push their cargo up and down stream.

The NAS report indicates that the people along the river and the state and federal agencies that have authority can find a balance between the commercial and agricultural interests and that of those who want better hunting, fishing, or simply better habitat for the sake of the wildlife and the natural beauty.

Chad Smith is with the environmental group American Rivers. He says it will take some compromises, but it can be done.

“The Missouri is not even close to living up to its potential. And we’re missing out on a lot of quality of life benefits, but also on a lot of economic benefits by managing this river as a ditch and not as a river.”

Smith stresses that no one is calling for the end of barge traffic on the Missouri, or wants the end of farming in the flood plain. But Smith says there’s been just a little too much development of the river, and we need to restore parts of it here and there.

The chief author of the National Academy of Sciences report, Steven Gloss, says that work needs to begin quickly because it will take a very long time to fix the Missouri River’s problems.

“We’ve been at this for a long time, a hundred years or better and, you know, it’s gonna take several decades to get it back a little bit in the other direction. I think we really need to look at this as a long-term sustained process. It’s not something we can find a solution for in five years and walk away from it. We need to be at this for the rest of our lives and for future generations.”

But Gloss stresses this cannot be a job for the government alone. The NAS report says the Missouri can only find balance between the competing interests if the people along the Missouri River all have a seat at the table and share in the river’s wealth.

For the Great Lakes Radio Consortium, this is Lester Graham.

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Walkerton Water Tragedy Revisited

The consequences of the tainted water tragedy in southern Ontario are still being assessed. Seven people died and more than two thousand were made sick nearly two years ago, when the bacteria E. coli was found in drinking water in Walkerton, Ontario. An inquiry into the tragedy lasted more than a year, and a preliminary report was released last month. It blamed the two men in charge of the public utilities commission in Walkerton. But it also pointed the finger at cuts made years before by the Ontario government. Environmentalists across the Great Lakes are concerned that unless the lessons of Walkerton are learned on both sides of the border, water supplies will again be placed at risk. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Dan Karpenchuk reports:

Transcript

The consequences of the tainted water tragedy in southern Ontario are still being assessed. Seven people died and more than two thousand were made sick nearly two years ago when the bacteria, E. coli, was found in drinking water in Walkerton, Ontario. An inquiry into the tragedy lasted more than a year, and a preliminary report was released last month. It blamed the two men in charge of the public utilities commission in Walkerton. But it also pointed the finger at cuts made years before by the Ontario government. Environmentalists across the Great Lakes are concerned that unless the lessons of Walkerton are learned on both sides of the border, water supplies will again be placed at risk. The Great Lakes Radio Consortiums Dan Karpenchuk reports from Toronto:

Walkerton is a small community of five thousand people about 135 miles northwest of Toronto not far from Lake Huron. There’s some light industry, some tourism… but agriculture is the economic mainstay. The E. coli disaster put the town of Walkerton in the headlines, where it’s remained. Some still feel the effects of the tainted water through an assortment of medical symptoms and complications. Others won’t drink the water; no matter what assurances they’ve been given that it’s safe. Many, like Robert Cooney, remain bitter.

“People in this town are sick of the whole thing. Yes, they got compensation. But for the people that are on dialysis and the people that lost loved ones, we’re looking for something. Something went wrong.”

There was a lot that went wrong, according to the man who headed the inquiry into the tragedy. In January, Justice Dennis O’Connor released his report. He concluded that the brothers who ran the Public Utilities Commission contributed directly to the tragedy, first by failing to properly monitor the drinking water, then by trying to cover up the emerging catastrophe by actively misleading health officials, assuring them the water was safe.

But O’Connor also turned his criticism on the government of Ontario, saying cuts to the MOE, or Ministry of Environment, undermined its ability to deal with the problems in Walkerton.

“The provincial government’s budget reductions led to the discontinuation of government laboratory testing services for municipalities in 1996.”

Now six years later, those services still have not been reinstated.

“In implementing this decision, the government should have enacted a regulation mandating that testing laboratories immediately and directly notify the MOE and the medical officer of health of adverse results. Had the government done this, the boil water advisory would have been issued by May 19 at the latest, thereby preventing hundreds of illnesses.”

The Conservative government in Ontario reacted quickly to the allegations. Premier Mike Harris, who early on during the inquiry, maintained that his government’s policies were not to blame, now did an about face.

“I deeply regret any factors leading to the events of May 2000, that were the responsibility of the government of Ontario either prior to or during my tenure as premier.”

Harris went further in his attempts to limit the political damage. He said many of the recommendations made by Justice O’Connor would be implemented. They included continuous chlorine monitors for wells, increased inspections and better training for operators.

But many critics say they they’re not convinced. They say a week after the 700-page report was released, neither Harris nor any member of his cabinet, had read it.

Far from Walkerton, the political fallout is being felt most in Toronto, seat of the province’s legislature…. and home to many of Ontario’s environmental groups.

The Canadian Institute for Environmental Law and Policies says the problems in Walkerton have called attention to the broader issue of water quality in the region. Researchers say the amount of pollutants discharged into rivers and lakes more than doubled between 1995 and 1999. And over the same period the number of provincial water testing sites was cut by two thirds.

That could have serious implications for the province’s lakes and rivers…. and since those systems feed into the Great Lakes, the entire region is at risk.

Professor Louis Mallott was involved in the study….

“We concluded that Ontario is unable to assess the overall quality of Ontario’s inland waters that flow into the Great Lakes. And this is necessary to determine whether Ontario’s environmental policies are effective.”

Over the past year almost four hundred cases of bad water have turned up in Ontario. E. coli and other bacteria have plagued water systems in towns, trailer parks, schools, private homes and even a nudist colony. And that worries people like Paul Muldoon, the executive director of the Canadian Environmental Law Association. Muldoon says Ontario is also sending a clear message south of the border, and it’s not a positive one.

“I am convinced that if I was in the U.S. right now, I could at least legitimately raise the issue, saying lookit Canadians sure we cause stresses in the Great Lakes and there’s lots of issues here. But don’t talk to us until you get your act together and Walkerton is a glowing example, you do not have your act together. And since Walkerton there’s not a lot of evidence you’ve got your act together yet despite that wake up call, despite the depth of that tragedy.”

The Ontario government, however, insists the situation is improving.

But critics aren’t buying it. They say Ontario’s environmental problems have not only jeopardized the province, but could affect the entire Great Lakes region. They say there is a clear message to governments on both sides of the border…. that budget cuts and privatization could lead to more tragedies like Walkerton.

For the Great Lakes Radio Consortium, I’m Dan Karpenchuk.

Dams Make Major Floods Worse?

  • The Army Corps of Engineers installed these wing dams to force the current to the middle. The rushing water scours the bottom of the channel to keep navigation open. A new study alleges the wing dams slow the current during major floods and cause flood waters to be higher. Photo by Lester Graham.

A recent study concludes that some actions of the Army Corps of Engineers might be causing more, rather than less damage during major floods on rivers in the Midwest. The study by two Washington University professors found that wing dams, which jut out into the river, could cause big floods to rise even higher. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Lester Graham takes a closer look at this study:

Transcript

A recent study concludes that some actions of the Army Corps of Engineers might be causing more, rather than less damage during major floods on rivers in the Midwest. The study by two Washington University professors found that wing dams which jut out into the river could cause big floods to rise even higher. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Lester Graham takes a closer look at this study:

The Mississippi and the Missouri rivers are two of the major arteries for barge transportation in America. Millions of tons of grain, and raw materials are floated up and down the rivers each year. It’s the Army Corps of Engineers’ job to keep the rivers open to barge traffic. The Corps has been doing that job for the past 150 years. But since the 1930’s that effort has taken on immense proportions. Huge dams hold back the river, keeping the water high enough for the barges to travel up and down-stream. Big earthen dikes, called levees, wall in the rivers, keeping them from flooding farms and towns, but also keeping the water from reaching the natural flood plain. Robert Criss and Everett Shock studied flood levels and the effects of the Corps of Engineers projects. Criss says those dams and levees alone might be enough to disrupt the flow of the river and cause flood stages to be higher.

“But the other component is these structures called wing-dams which are jetties of rocks that project out perpendicularly into the channel. For high-flow conditions, these act something like scale in a pipe. They impede the flow, restricting the channel. That slows the velocity of the water down and that also makes the flood stages higher.”

The purpose of wing dams is to force the current to the middle of the river to scour out the navigation channel to keep it open for the barges. Researcher Everett Shock.

“So, they do the job they’re intended to do. It seems that there’s an unintended–perhaps unintended consequence of all these constructions along the river that shows up when we have a big flood and makes it to –on the basis of our study– makes these big floods worse.”

Criss and Shock say their study finds that since these flood control projects have been erected, there have been more big floods, such as the one in 1993 that flooded the Mississippi and some of its tributaries for most of the summer. Robert Criss.

“The fact is, before World War II, a flood stage of 38-feet is very rare and now it happens every five years.”

But not everyone agrees with the methodology used by the researchers. The
Corps of Engineers dismisses the researchers’ study, saying they used flawed data. Corps officials point to a study at the University of Missouri – Rolla. That study compared the 19th century method of measuring a river’s flow by timing how fast floats moved in the current to the methods used today. Dave Busse is a scientist with the Army Corps of Engineers. He says the original stream flow measurements –the ones Criss and Shock used— were inaccurate.

“The flows were over-estimated by 30-percent using this float measurements rather than the measurements than we use today.”

Criss and Shock are skeptical of new numbers that the Corps prefers. Saying it seems awfully convenient for the Corps because changing the numbers makes the historic floods look smaller and therefore makes the 1993 flood look unprecedented. Criss and Shock say based on the original records, there was as much water in past floods as in the 1993 flood but lower water levels. Criss and Shock say the difference between then and now is that the Corps’ big dams, levees, and wing dams constrict the river’s flow and make floods higher.

The Corps, however, has other criticisms of the Criss and Shock study. Dave Busse says the researchers ignored the role of the Corps’ reservoirs in the rivers’ watersheds. Busse says the reservoirs hold back water that would otherwise be part of a flood. And Busse says, another flaw is the researchers conclusions about wing dams. The Corps says the wing dams force water to deepen the channel and increases the flow of the river.

“So, what we have is the same –it’s a re-shaped river, but its carrying capacity is actually higher now. We can actually carry more water at the same stage. The river got deeper, therefore this conclusion that they’ve made is wrong.”

The Corps says there’s more to managing the river than the researchers have considered. Criss and Schock, meanwhile, say their study is not the first to be dismissed by the Corps of Engineers. They say other studies have found similar results, but the Corps dismissed them as well.

Environmentalists have been arguing for decades that levees and dams keep floodwaters from spreading out on their natural flood plains and cause higher flood levels. The Criss and Shock study adds to their arsenal of arguments to change the way the rivers are managed. But most environmentalists concede that we’ve become somewhat dependent on the Corps flood control projects. Chad Smith is with the environmental group,
American Rivers.

“In most ways both of these camps are right. The Corps is right that putting some of the structure in has helped to reduce the kind of annual flood events that always happen on a big river like this, but what they unfortunately have done is to exacerbate what happens when you have bigger floods and the wing dams and the levees and the dams themselves all are part of that.”

The Army Corps of Engineers says it’s reviewing its way of managing rivers in light of the 1993 flood. But they also note that while flood stages might be higher more often than they were in the 19th century, most of the time those floodwaters remain behind the floodwalls and levees, protecting the communities from high water, and the Corps says in the end, that’s the only fact that really matters.

Ijc to Monitor Lake Flows

A commission that oversees water bodies shared by the U.S. and Canada is expanding its study of water levels in the Great Lakes. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Karen Kelly has more:

Transcript

A commission that oversees water bodies shared by the U.S. and Canada is expanding its study of water levels in the Great Lakes. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Karen Kelly reports.


The International Joint Commission recently announced it would review its regulation of water flowing in and out of Lake Superior. Any changes to Superior’s water flow could affect Lake Michigan and Lake Huron, as well. The commission is already studying similar changes in the regulation of Lake Ontario’s water. Officials say the studies were prompted by residents’ complaints about low water levels as well as the expected onset of climate change. Scientists predict this could also affect lake levels.


Peter Yee is the manager of the Great Lakes-St. Lawrence regulation office for Environment Canada.


“We have the opportunity to dialogue with the public so that we have a mutual understanding and appreciation of everybody’s needs and concerns, the benefits of regulation and also the limitations of regulation.”


Public hearings are scheduled to begin this fall.


For the Great Lakes Radio Consortium, I’m Karen Kelly.