Interesting article about Lake Erie and beyond

[afishinado]

Giving rights to Lakes (Erie in this case) which allows municipalities to sue polluters. Other examples of this happening later in the article.

https://www.nytimes.com/2019/02/17/us/lake-erie-legal-rights.html

 

[Tigereye]

While I am all for clean water and air, in fact it is my profession, I don't think this is a good idea. In principle, yes we do need to clean up a lot of waterways. This idea provides way too much room for abuse with overzealous agencies. Just look at the Clean Water Act. Agencies are still trying interpret what "Waters of the US" means. A pond in someone's yard? A rain barrel catching water off your roof?

Protect the lake, yes, but need to find a better path forward. Don't think this is the answer.

Without getting too political here, we cant even get rights for unborn babies.

 

[RLeep2]

I'm somewhat uncomfortable with the assignment of these sorts of rights to individual lakes, streams or bodies of water. The concept has merit on it's face, but I would worry that it could be used to attack sport fishing. It reminds me a little too much of the animal rights groups who argue against hunting and fishing based on alleged harm to a sentient being, a very bad and slippery precedent, IMO.

I'm much more comfortable with the existing (at least I think it still exists...) provision of the Clean Water Act in particular that allows for citizen suits against polluters for loss of recreational opportunities. This not only allows for folks like you and I at the grassroots level to seek redress or correction of illegal water quality degradation through the courts, it also keeps the issue in the more real-world utilization sphere and away from this more cosmic notion that lakes, rivers and streams are living, breathing entities with rights. As good as it sounds, I think it could and likely would be used to attack fishing.

YMM of course V..

 

[ryansheehan]

Thanks for posting, interesting article, there has to be a way of cleaning up runoff without giving a lake legal standing, a slippery slope to say the last.

 

[Acristickid]

Let’s see the fear and trepidation (of govt agencies) when Toledo can’t drink water and Lake Erie is in full bloom. Seems like it mostly the farming practices that are dooming the lake.

 

[afishinado]

It started in Tamaqua, PA with the companies dumping waste into the abandoned coal mines and showing up in the water table >

Tamaqua Borough, Pa., in the center of the state’s historic coal-mining region, was the first place in the nation to approve a rights-of-nature ordinance in 2006 after it banned companies from dumping dredged minerals and sewage sludge into open pit mines.

The bill approved by the borough council included language that said corporations could not “interfere with the existence and flourishing of natural communities or ecosystems, or to cause damage” to them within the township.

Four years later, Pittsburgh approved a rights-of-nature ordinance that prohibited fracking in city limits.

 

[Tigereye]

Oh boy...do I remember that. Afish. I was a consultant for the borough when they wanted to bring river dredge in to fill one of the mine pits. A lot of politics at play.

A brief summary is that the Delaware river is dredged to keep shipping lanes open. The dredge material is stored on the riverbanks occupying valuable river frontage. The dredge for the most part is clay like (that gets washed into the Delaware from upstream counties ie Schuylkill etal.) The premise of the project is that by "plugging" the pits with the dredge you eliminate both the physical hazard of an open pit and eliminate groundwater contamination when filling the pit with clay. Simultaneously you are are cleaning up river frontage from stockpiles of dredge material.


In the case of the Mt Pisgah pit in the article, it was 65 ft+/-. Water does not perk or leach through clay. 65 ft of clay is quite a barrier. Thus water would be surface run off which can be more cheaply and effectively controlled than the case of it leaching through mine overburden and into ground water.

It really was a win/win/win scenario cleaning up the river and preventing future sediment contamination, cleaning up ground water, and eliminating the physical hazard of open pits.

Money, politics, and ignorance played a major roll. I'll never do it again.

http://articles.mcall.com/2003-01-22/news/3458425_1_silt-hazardous-waste-levels

 

[FarmerDave]

Tigereye wrote:

Money, [color=660000]politics, and ignorance[/color] played a major roll. I'll never do it again.

I'm thinking the part in red is redundant. ;-)

 

[FarmerDave]

acristickid wrote:
Let’s see the fear and trepidation (of govt agencies) when Toledo can’t drink water and Lake Erie is in full bloom. Seems like it mostly the farming practices that are dooming the lake.

True, except for the dooming part.

Lake has been doomed for well over 100 years, yet it is in way better shape than it was 50 years ago.

Not saying we should sit on our hands.

As far as farmers go...

Decades ago the issue with farming was silt from agriculture. Well, then there was a huge movement to go no-till.

And the politicians and farmers rejoiced. So did Monsanto when they figured out they can genetically engineer these crops to be resistant to the herbicides that they also produced. Captive audience, and they were vicious in their patent enforcement. This made no-till much more effective (cheaper).

Then the algae came along. With no-till, fertilizers (both organic and chemical) run off much more freely.

A better approach needs to be reached because farming isn't going away.

Cover crops can be a big help. Not only do they hold things in place, they also add nutrients and organic matter.

There is also a lot of sewage still entering the lake, but I don't have any numbers on that (other than number 2).

The guy who is farming my fields tills maybe every other year. But that's OK because the Pittsburgh is downstream. ;-)

 

[Tigereye]

Sure is FD. Some of the questions, statements, and testimony of the folks and politicians bordered on the absurd.