What's New Seaway, river group agree to disagree Watertown daily Times (11/17) For several years, Save the River has been fighting winter navigation through the Seaway and efforts to expand the water route to accommodate larger, oceangoing vessels.
Highland Park to upgrade sewage pumping plant Lake County News-Sun (11/17) A sewage pumping station located in a ravine along Cary Avenue at Lake Michigan will soon be upgraded to prevent future sewage overflows into the lake.
Pleasant Prairie votes to create one sewer district for community Kenosha News (11/17) The Village Board voted Monday to create one sanitary sewer district for the whole community, continuing a consolidation effort needed to comply with the approaching end of a 20-year-old Great Lakes water diversion.
Solving E. coli issue could be long, drawn out process The Arenac County Independent (11/9) Although the E. coli in Arenac County's portion of Saginaw Bay may not be extremely harmful, Michigan's Department of Environmental Quality decided now was the time to address the situation.
The state of the Great Lakes Toledo On The Move (10/28) We live and thrive by the way of the Great Lakes. Not to mention Lake Erie is one of the most developed of them all with 80 percent of the watershed used by us.
Overview
Wet weather pollution includes stormwater runoff and combined sewer overflows. Stormwater runoff is the excess water that flows over land during and after a rainfall, which can cause flooding, erosion and pollution problems. Pollutants like coliform bacteria, heavy metals, nutrients, oil and grease, organic priority pollutants and suspended solids enter rivers and lakes during storms. Combined sewer overflows are structural devices on combined sewer systems that divert untreated sewage mixed with stormwater to tributary rivers or directly into the Great Lakes. Pollution from these sources degrades the water quality of these rivers and lakes.
General Resources Programs in the Great Lakes U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) The USGS leads investigations that characterize storm-related water quantity and quality from selected CSO's, thus allowing the USGS to make better estimates of annual pollutant loads from CSO's to the Great Lakes.
Rouge River National Wet Weather Demonstration Project The Rouge Project recognizes the importance of addressing wet weather pollution problems in the river and developing a cost-effective watershed wide approach to deal with them.
Summary of Great Lakes Beach Closings 1981-1994 U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), Great Lakes National Program Office (GLNPO) The Beach Closing Summary presents the findings of 14 years of annual surveys of Great Lakes bathing beaches.
SWMM: Storm Water Management Model U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) SWMM is a large, complex model capable of simulating the movement of precipitation and pollutants from the ground surface through pipe and channel networks, storage treatment units and finally to receiving waters.
Wet Weather Discharges U.S. Enviromental Protection Agency (EPA) The NPDES Support and Technical Assistance Branch provides regulatory and technical assistance to states and the regulated community in fulfilling their commitments under the NPDES program for wet weather discharges due to storm water, combined sewer overflow and sanitary sewer ovewflow.