Protecting Rivers & Your Clean Water
Making Progress Means Investing In Every Drop
Matt Niemerski, Director, Western Water Policy
May 14, 2013 | Most Endangered Rivers, Water Pollution, Water Supply
Kudos to the City of San Diego who seems to be ready to rise to the challenge of restoring balance to its water usage and the realities of an over stretched and dwindling supply.
The San Diego City Council approved new water purification plans intended to produce up to 40 percent of the city’s current water usage.
Read more »Susquehanna Fish Diseased Yet The River Is Not “Impaired”
Liz G. Deardorff, Director, Clean Water Program Pennsylvania
May 13, 2013 | Water Pollution, Urban Rivers
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has approved Pennsylvania’ Department of Protection list of impaired waterways disappointing advocates for a healthy Susquehanna River.
Read more »Knowing When To Say No
Jessie Thomas-Blate, Coordinator, Most Endangered Rivers
May 13, 2013 | Most Endangered Rivers, Water Pollution
I live in a suburb of Washington, D.C., where strip malls are the norm. It gives me great peace of mind to know that places like Bristol Bay (including the Kvichack and Nushagak Rivers and their tributaries) exist. Even if I never see it in person, I can picture in my head the wild free-flowing rivers with their abundant runs of salmon, Arctic char, rainbow trout, dolly varden, and grayling.
Read more »April Showers Bring May...
Fay Augustyn, Conservation Associate
May 10, 2013 | Climate Change, Floods & Floodplains, Water Supply
Who doesn’t remember the little saying from our childhood, “April showers bring May flowers?” I sure do, but I’m not so sure that the next generation will. My spring memories are full of raincoats and galoshes followed by walking barefoot through flowerbeds full of blooming peonies, irises and roses. This spring however, had a less traditional weather path, with April and May chalk full of blizzards, floods, wildfires, and drought.
Read more »Growing Algal Blooms Pose Public Health Risks
Fay Augustyn, Conservation Associate
May 9, 2013 | Climate Change, Water Supply
As we all learned in school, the Great Lakes are an immense source of freshwater. In fact, they are the largest system of freshwater lakes in the entire world and contain nearly one-fifth of the fresh surface water found on earth. They provide drinking water to more than 40 million people, cover an area nearly the size of Oregon, and contain a wide variety of habitats, including wetlands, dunes, and forests, which are home to thousands of plant and animal species.
Read more »New WRDA, Same Old Congress
Eileen Fretz, Flood Policy Director
May 8, 2013 | Floods & Floodplains
This week, the Senate is debating a bill called the Water Resources Development Act (WRDA), S 601, that will tell the Army Corps of Engineers what water infrastructure to build on our nation’s rivers and coasts. WRDA is usually a long list of flood control, navigation, water supply, ecosystem restoration projects that Congress wants built, but, the earmark ban means Members have had to find more creative ways to bring home the bacon.
Read more »A Miner’s Take on Mining the Boundary Waters
Jessie Thomas-Blate, Coordinator, Most Endangered Rivers
May 8, 2013 | Most Endangered Rivers, Water Pollution
My wife, Pat, and I stopped by the South Kawishiwi River last week. The river current is starting to take out the ice in the narrows, and in a few days we'll have a canoe in the water again.
We see evidence of exploratory drilling for copper-nickel mines, but spring load limits are on some of the roads so we won't see the big rigs moving for a few days. So far, the drilling has confirmed that the Duluth Complex is a low grade ore body in a high grade environment— Superior National Forest.
