Water Quality Enforcement in the Scott Pruitt Era

The appointment of Scott Pruitt as Administrator of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency was an abomination. His hostility toward environmental protection has been clear, as has his intent to dismantle protections long ago enacted into law.

Negotiation with Pruitt and his subordinates is a waste of time. As concerns water quality, U.S. subsidies to agriculture that push expansion of cultivation into marginal lands, requiring heavy fertilization, has resulted in massive amounts of nutrients like nitrogen and phosphorus to run off into lakes and streams, generating algal blooms, oxygen depletion and dead zones. This is particularly evident in the Maumee River watershed and the western basin of Lake Erie.

In order to compel Pruitt’s EPA to restrict nutrient runoff, we need to study the elements and procedures, get organized and head to court.

The fastest, most concise way for the serious student to become acquainted with the struggle for water quality in the U.S., including related politics, government and law, is to read the appellate decision in the Chesapeake Bay case, American Farm Bureau, et al. vs. EPA, et al. (which the U.S. Supreme Court declined to review). http://media.ca8.uscourts.gov/opndir/16/09/151234P.pdf

The agriculture/environment conflict appears again in a pending federal case concerning impairment by ag pollution in the western basin of Lake Erie.  http://elpc.org/newsroom/howards-blog/elpc-litigation-driving-results-ohio-epa-recognizes-reality-lake-erie-impaired-pollution-key-next-steps  

Accommodating nutrient runoff - Shutterstock

Algal bloom in western Lake Erie - NASA

Lake Sturgeon Population Recovering Near Detroit

The lake sturgeon population in the Great Lakes has been declining for more than a century. It is thought that today’s numbers may be as little as one percent of what they used to be. They are considered threatened or endangered in most states in their range. A mature adult can grow to seven feet and 200 to 300 pounds. They can live for many decades.

A year and a half ago, a barge crew dropped “... 25,000 tons of limestone blocks on the bottom of the Detroit River in the latest phase of a decade-plus effort to lure lake sturgeon to rock spawning reefs and help restore severely depleted populations of the once-common Great Lakes giants.”

UW Stevens Point - Nature Conservancy

The project “... added 4 acres of high-quality spawning habitat just upstream of Belle Isle, bringing the total to 16.6 acres at six locations in the Detroit and St. Clair rivers.”

 Austin Thomason, Michigan Photography

The reefs are “… built from blocks of broken limestone 4 to 8 inches in diameter.”

They work. Sturgeon eggs have been collected on the reefs. Researchers have found young sturgeon in the fast current of the north channel of the St. Clair River, downstream from a reef, before the channel reaches Lake St. Clair.

https://news.umich.edu/searching-for-young-lake-sturgeon-near-detroit-area-spawning-reefs/

New PCB Cleanup Proposed for St. Clair Shores Superfund Site

St. Clair Shores - marinas.com

Recently, US EPA announced plans to remove soil contaminated with polychlorinated biphenyl (PCB) from several locations encompassing approximately 30 (mostly residential) lots in the Ten Mile Drain Superfund area of St. Clair Shores, MI. The agency encourages public comment on the proposal. Excerpts:

"The site is northeast of Detroit on the western shores of Lake St. Clair in Macomb County, Mich. The site covers several city blocks where PCBs have been found inside the Ten-Mile Drain system as well as near-surface soil and sediment (mud) in the Lange and Revere Street canals connected to Lake St. Clair. The site was placed on the National Priorities List in 2010 making it eligible for cleanup funds under EPA’s Superfund program."

"Investigators believe PCB-contaminated oil originated from a historical release at the commercial property located at the corner of Lakeland Street and Harper Avenue in Investigation Area 1. It appears the PCB-tainted oil was dumped there or used for dust control on a former dirt parking lot. There is not an ongoing release of PCBs from the commercial property to the Ten Mile Drain system."

"Several investigations and cleanup actions have taken place since PCBs were first discovered at the site in 2001."

https://semspub.epa.gov/work/05/940536.pdf