Conserving Water

Metropolitan regions around the Midwest are expanding rapidly into neighboring farmland and natural areas, but few people are asking, “Is there enough water?” The allocation of water from Lake Michigan is limited by Supreme Court decree. Many areas on the fringe of the Chicago region are predicted to suffer water shortages within the next 20 years, but development is booming in those same locations. At the same time, new development is dramatically increasing demand for water and damaging the needed water supplies. Hundreds of thousands of acres of new parking lots, roads, and other impervious surfaces prevent rainwater from soaking into the ground and replenishing groundwater supplies – and the water that is able to soak in often ends up polluted by gasoline, oils, road salts, or fertilizers and pesticides from suburban lawns. Shallow aquifers are increasingly polluted, and deep aquifers become more contaminated by radon the further they are drawn down.

By 2020, a number of townships and municipalities in the Chicago region will not have access to a sufficient amount of water to meet growing demand. Most of these shortages are projected for the “outer counties” where rapid growth is occurring without consideration of the availability of, or impact on, water supplies and where rapid growth is also threatening water quality.

ELPC is working with key stakeholders in these communities to achieve three goals: (1) Promote smart growth planning policies and practices that will enable suitable development to go forward: (2) Protect vulnerable groundwater resources from contamination; and (3) Protect surface water resources in Northern Illinois rivers, lakes and streams from development pressures that can harm aquatic ecosystems. We believe that our efforts will increase the level of discussion about these critical issues and promote solutions that meet the growth and environmental needs of these communities.

Learn how you can conserve water and help keep our water clean.

Mississippi River Protection

The Mississippi River provides drinking water for over 18 million people. It is an important cultural, recreational, economic, and wildlife resource. Each summer, however, a “Dead Zone” roughly the size of the state of Massachusetts forms in the Gulf of Mexico at the river’s south end. In 2005, ELPC joined the Water Quality Collaborative, a diverse group of regional and national non-profit organizations devoted to improving the health of our nation’s largest river.

Several factors impede the health of the Mississippi River. Inadequate government oversight, lack of coordination among non-profit organizations, and lack of federal protection from agricultural runoff makes restoring the river very difficult. Agricultural runoff is the primary source of excess sediments and nutrients in the Mississippi River. Fertilizers accumulating in the Gulf of Mexico allow plants to grow to excess, starving the waters of oxygen and killing fish and wildlife. Each summer, this creates a “Dead Zone” roughly the size of Massachusetts in the Gulf.

More than 20 regional and national non-profit organizations comprise the Water Quality Collaborative. This provides a special opportunity for member organizations to build off one another’s strengths. Working as a unified group with shared goals will fill knowledge gaps and extend the resources of the various groups beyond traditional boundaries.

Preserving Wisconsin’s Northwoods

The Chequamegon-Nicolet National Forest was recently identified as one of the “10 most endangered national forests” in the nation. It is one of the most heavily-logged national forests in the Eastern region (which stretches from Minnesota to Maine). At the cutting rate employed over the last 10 years, every single log-able acre would be cut in 45 years. The harmful impacts of such extensive logging on waterways, habitat and related natural resources and conservation goals are significant. ELPC is working through federal courts to protect this treasured resource.

The Chequamegon-Nicolet National Forest (CNNF) is a very special place. CNNF covers approximately 1.5 million acres in the northern part of Wisconsin, including numerous rivers and more than 300 species of animals. The CNNF consists primarily of northern hardwood, mixed conifer, and aspen trees, along with numerous rivers, lakes and other waterways. Its habitat include several endangered and threatened species, such as the Northern goshawk, Red-shouldered hawk and American pine marten.

We need to restore ecological balance to this very special place in the Midwest.

ELPC doesn’t want logging to stop—just to be more balanced with environmental considerations. In so doing, we can continue logging employment where it makes sense, while also preserving the outdoor environment for the growing tourism industry.

Learn more about ELPC’s efforts to protect the CNNF.

New Activist Tools to Protect the Northwoods

This interactive map shows proposed timber sales in the CNNF as well as some favorite cross country ski trails, personal stories and photos submitted by people who love the northwoods. You can send us your stories or photos to add to the map.

View Wisconsin’s Northwoods in a larger map

Protecting Clean Water

The Mississippi River Watershed is the second largest watershed in the world supporting an extensive variety of habitats including wetland, open-water, and floodplain, many of which are national wildlife refuges. Pollutants enter this system from agricultural, metropolitan and industrial areas and have a serious impact on all living creatures, and can negatively affect the use of water for drinking, household needs, recreation, fishing, transportation and commerce.

ELPC is currently working on several initiatives to protect clean water in the Midwest. Learn how you can help keep our water clean.

Iowa Water Quality Standards and Permitting

For the past several years, ELPC has been working with our colleagues and partners in Iowa (including the Iowa Environmental Council, Sierra Club, and the Hawkeye Fly Fishing Association) to enforce the Clean Water Act and improve the quality of Iowa’s rivers, lakes and streams. Although we have made significant improvements, there is much work to be done.  In general, Iowa does not begin to implement the Clean Water Act properly and regularly issues permits that are not protective of Iowa recreation, aquatic life or downstream waters. Working with the Iowa Environmental Council, Sierra Club and Hawkeye Flyfishing Council, we have begun to take action against the three biggest problems in the Iowa Department of Natural Resources program.

Antidegradation Standards

ELPC has worked extensively to implement and enforce the Clean Water Act’s important antidegradation requirements. These rules, intended to “keep clean water clean,” have been seriously underutilized by states in the Midwest. In 2006, ELPC persuaded Illinois to adopt antidegradation rules that are among the strongest in the nation. We are now working with partners in Iowa, Indiana, Kentucky, and several other states to adopt similarly strong rules. In September 2008, ELPC attorneys prevailed in a federal lawsuit challenging U.S. EPA for its approval of weak antidegradation standards in Kentucky. This case will provide important precedent for our efforts to promote strong antidegradation standards throughout the region.

Working to Develop Strong Water Quality Standards for Nutrients

Nutrients such as nitrogen and phosphorus are causing major water quality problems in the Midwest and a “dead zone” in the Gulf of Mexico. These pollutants come primarily fertilizer and other agricultural runoff as well as wastewater treatment plants that discharge into our rivers. ELPC has worked at the federal, regional and state level to develop protective numeric nutrient standards for the Mississippi River basin. Working with the Clean Water Network and NRDC, we have written and met with U.S. EPA headquarters regarding phosphorus controls that could be established immediately and urged U.S. EPA to work more aggressively to cause adoption of nitrogen standards to protect the Gulf of Mexico.

Evaluating State Non-Point Source Pollution Programs throughout the Midwest

Although the Clean Water Act does an adequate job regulating individual “point-sources” of pollution (e.g. discharges from sewage treatment plants and industry), it does not cover agricultural runoff and other “non-point” discharges. While every state in the Midwest has at least some non-point pollution control programs, the details and effectiveness of such participation varies by state. Therefore, ELPC is working to evaluate each state’s effort at addressing non-point source pollution, with the goal of identifying and recommending the most effective strategies.

Learn more about our efforts around the Midwest to protect clean water.

Protecting Our Natural Heritage

Our Midwest wild and natural areas are, too often, threatened by logging, mining, sprawl and other harmful activities. ELPC works with grassroots groups throughout the Midwest to protect special places that are our environmental heritage and to ensure that fragile ecosystems and habitat are preserved. Our advocacy work ranges from fighting to preserve the Driftless Area, one of the top biodiversity “hotspots” in the Midwest, to preventing a dam on Sugar Creek proposed by the City of Marion that would destroy more than six miles of one of the last free-flowing streams in Illinois. Blocking extensive timber harvesting efforts in Wisconsin, collaborating to protect and enhance water quality in the Mississippi River and its watershed, and working to maintain the health of the largest surface freshwater system on earth – the Great Lakes – are just a few of ELPC’s other active projects.