Blog posts by FLOW team and guest writers
By Carrie La Seur FLOW Legal Director I first encountered the Pine River of central Michigan in May 2024, a season when I was reading Wendell Berry’s The Way of Ignorance as meditation. The robins were nesting a second time on the drain pipe of our house outside Traverse City and indigo buntings had taken… Read more »
Prompted by the drinking water crisis in Flint 10 years ago, the U.S. EPA announced on October 8 a 10-year deadline for replacement of all lead service lines in the U.S. This important project will be largely funded by more than $15 billion from the 2021 federal bipartisan infrastructure law. EPA’s final Lead and Copper… Read more »
Traverse City, Mich.—On October 22, FLOW (For Love of Water) and Great Lakes Business Network (GLBN) filed a brief calling on the U.S. Court of Appeals to stop a pipeline company from stripping away Michigan’s power to protect the Great Lakes. Enbridge Energy, which owns the dual Line 5 pipelines, launched the 2020 federal lawsuit… Read more »
I recently spoke before a lively and well-informed audience at the St. Clair Public Library in Port Huron. As is always the case, when I opened the floor for questions and comments, a dozen arms shot up. Everyone had thoughtful and important things to say, but most of the questions boiled down to two major… Read more »
In these times of partisan division, it’s important to recognize that one issue has united Michigan voters for over 50 years: Four times since 1968, they have approved by large margins the issuance of general obligation bonds to pay for critical environmental needs. But the last such proposal reached the ballot in 2002. Why? It’s… Read more »
Change is coming to the lakebed and waters of the Great Lakes. Two more units of the National Marine Sanctuary system are on deck for federal approval. The question is whether Michigan will take additional steps to protect its own Great Lakes lakebed and waters. Administered by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), a… Read more »
If there was ever any doubt that an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure, a recent estimate of the cost to Michigan taxpayers of cleaning up environmental contamination should have dispelled it. According to the Michigan Department of Environment, Great Lakes and Energy (EGLE), there are some 13,000 so-called orphan sites across… Read more »
One of the military clashes between England and the United States was the battle of Lake Erie. On September 10, 1813, nine ships under U.S. Master Commandant Oliver Hazard Perry bested a nine-ship English fleet in a decisive battle for control of western Lake Erie and surrounding lands. Today, a 352-foot International Peace Memorial on… Read more »
Lost in the barrage of bad news about harmful pollutants, invasive species, habitat loss, and climate change is quiet progress on some long-term challenges. The statistics bear this out and suggest the potential for successfully addressing today’s environmental problems. Our rivers and lakes are noticeably cleaner than they were when Congress passed the Clean Water… Read more »
A popular vehicle decal says the Great Lakes are “unsalted and shark-free.” Is it true? Not if you consider road salt and salt from water softeners. In 2021, scientific researchers estimated chlorides in Lake Michigan had risen from about 1-2 milligrams per liter before European settlement to more than fifteen milligrams per liter. Canadian researchers… Read more »
