Beltane\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Waxing Garlic Moon<\/p>\n
Spent most of the day at an event focused on implementation of the Great Lakes Water Compact, an unusual and comprehensive agreement among the 8 Great Lakes States and two Canadian provinces.\u00a0 It was held at the REI in Bloomington, the one with the very tall climbing wall.\u00a0 It also has nicely landscaped grounds with native plants and water falls.-<\/p>\n
American political processes have wheels within wheels attached to gears that trip levers and start small balls rolling down tipping boards which fall and in falling create a cascade of effects near and far.<\/p>\n
The Great Lakes Water Compact Council consists of the 8 states signatory to the agreement.\u00a0 There is a larger group that contains Ontario and Quebec.\u00a0 This outfit has the responsibility for overseeing the implementation of the accord reached in 2008.\u00a0\u00a0 On a budget of roughly $100,000.\u00a0 Which dries up this year.\u00a0 Who funds this group?\u00a0 The 8 states.\u00a0 Will the 8 states raise money from themselves to move this body forward?\u00a0 Remains to be seen.<\/p>\n
This meeting today, which included DNR folks, environmental groups and legislative types wanted to push the Compact forward in spite of its very real limitations, both political and fiscal.<\/p>\n
It has the stated aim of stopping diversion of water out of the Great Lakes, period, and to regulate water diversions within the watershed.\u00a0 It began when folks concerned about the Great Lakes discovered that an Ontario agency had approved a permit for a Chinese company to ship millions of gallons of Lake Huron water back to China for bottled water.\u00a0 The furor over this (the diversion, not the fact that it was China.) caused Ontario to back down and an odd coalition of businesses, chamber of commerces, enivronmentalists and politicians to sit down and hammer out a way to ensure that such diversions never proceed and to create a framework for monitoring and regulating Great Lakes Water.<\/p>\n
This all makes sense to me and I’m glad to see all the various political, environmental and regulatory folks working earnestly to make it happen.<\/p>\n
This circling of the Great Lakes wagons does beg the question of how a fresh water rich region will fare in a world gone thirsty.\u00a0 The compact sets up a governing body to handle matters within the total Great Lakes watershed and the smaller watersheds that constitute it, but they do nothing to prevent Arizona, Nevada, China, Saudi Arabia or any other water poor region from looking at us with envy and perhaps a little hostility.<\/p>\n
You might say, what about what we tell all 5 year olds?\u00a0 “You just have to learn to share.”<\/p>\n
Here’s the problem.\u00a0 The average recharge rate for the Great Lakes is 1% a year.\u00a0 What that means is that any diversion over 1% will actually draw down the volume of waters in the lake.<\/p>\n
In case you think this is a far away problem consider the poor Aral Sea.\u00a0 In 1989 it was full, but supporting multiple farming operations, most of them growing cotton.\u00a0 In 2008 it had barren lake bottom with ships sitting of what had been lake bed.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Beltane\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Waxing Garlic Moon Spent most of the day at an event focused on implementation of the Great Lakes Water Compact, an unusual and comprehensive agreement among the 8 Great Lakes States and two Canadian provinces.\u00a0 It was held at the REI in Bloomington, the one with the very tall climbing wall.\u00a0 It also has … Continue reading Water, Water, Not Everywhere. But, Here.<\/span>