EPA: Water transfers will not need permits

[maddezmom]

Source: AP

WASHINGTON - The movement of billions of gallons of water around the country for drinking, irrigation and other uses will not require permits under the Clean Water Act, even though the water could contain contaminants, the Bush administration announced Monday.

The new rule will allow water to be diverted from one body to another without a discharge permit, which is typically required when pollutants are released directly into streams, rivers and other surface waters.

Instead, Environmental Protection Agency officials said, the agency will focus on preventing contaminants from entering water sources in the first place. In addition, safe drinking water laws ensure water is clean before it flows into households, and other parts of the Clean Water Act — such as water quality standards — will still protect supplies.

"Clean water permits should focus on water pollution, not water movement," Benjamin H. Grumbles, the EPA's assistant administrator for water, said in a statement. He later noted that the decision reaffirmed the agency's 30-year view of the Clean Water Act.



Read more: http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080609/ap_on_go_ca_st_pe/water_transfers;_ylt=AsHWvhqSmWKjYim0eKzjUcgD5gcF

[navarth]

1. clearing the way for stealing the Great Lakes?

opinions?

[HereSince1628]

3. Not unless the US wants to go to war with Canada and it's Great Lake state allies.

The states and provinces that regulate the lakes through international agreement don't even let water move outside the watershed, which denies many people living less than 10 miles from the lakes access to the water.

In Wisconsin the radium content of munincipal well water could be improved by diluting it with lake water and the great lakes commission fought doing that for years.

[noonwitch]

11. We've got our own deals with the Canadians

The Governors of Michigan, Illinois, Indiana, Wisconsin, and so forth have their own deals to protect the lakes, with Ontario.

John McCain promised that he wouldn't tap the Great Lakes to resolve water shortages in the southwest. Of course, he's lying because he thinks he can win Michigan.

[HereSince1628]

14. Yes, I think that is what I was saying. Of all the states and provinces Michigan

is the most at liberty to do as it pleases with water from the Great Lakes, because it is completely in the watershed.

But, all the activity must take place within the international agreement and any single state can veto a variant project. Michigan has been quite inflexible. Wisconsin cities sited astride the divide of the watershed must serve part of the city with water sources (usually deep wells contaminated with radium and so in non-complaince with federal and state water quality standards) that aren't associated with the lake.

Given the resistance Wisconsin has experienced it is difficult to imagine how the western or southern US would ever get access short of war.

[Jackpine Radical]

4. Hell, that was my first thought.

[happyslug]

6. Have you looked into HOW someone would "Steal" the Water in the Great lakes?

The first big problem is HOW to get the water pass the Mississippi river. Truck, barge or Train are to expensive to move water on the scale needed. That leaves pipelines or canals. Pipelines have the advantage of being sealed, so that you can duck under something like the Mississippi and then the water in the pipe will raise to its own level (i.e. the pipeline can go down to the Mississippi, go under that River, then the pipeline can return to the same height it was before it hit the Mississippi. Canals, being open to the air, will have to flow into the Mississippi, but canals can be larger and haul the water needed.

After you cross the Mississippi, how do you get it to where it is needed, the Southwest? You have two choices, up the Missouri and Plate River Systems or up the Red River System. Either way you have to reverse flow either river i.e. instead of feeding the Mississippi, the rivers will be feed by the Mississippi. Reversing either can be done, but we are talking Trillions of Dollars, The cost of building the Panama Canal would look like a cheap tip compared to the Cost of reversing these rivers (And that is assuming we use constant dollars NOT the actual dollar spent, since the Panama Canal was built in the early 1900s when Gold was $20 an Ounce not the almost $1000 an ounce of today).

The Red River has an additional problem, how do you get over the Rio Grande? The Rio Grande flows forms the Border of Texas and Mexico, but before El Paso it is the central river in the State of New Mexico. IT is also the HIGHEST River in the nation. Whether you use a pipeline or a Canal, the water has to be pumped up and over the Rio Grande (A Tunnel could be built, but it will be about 500 miles through solid rock AND YOU WILL STILL HAVE TO PUMP THE WATER UPHILL for the ultimate goal, the Colorado River starts high in the Rocky Mountains, and the Colorado is how the water is going to be shipped into Nevada, Arizona and even California using existing irrigation systems (and expansions on those systems).

The Missouri Plate system starts further up steam of the Mississippi River then the Red River System, but you still have to tunnel under the Rocky mountains or pump the water OVER the Rocky Mountains. While you can avoid the Rio Grande of the Plate is used, but this is more a result of having to go even further up hill on the higher mountains of the state of Colorado.

My point is simple, the people who talk about shifting water from the Great Lakes to the Southwest have NEVER looked into HOW that is to be done. Once you do so, even if all you do is 1-2 hour research on the net, the cost of what is needed becomes clear (Not the Actual cost, but that it will be extremely high). Thus people who have looked into it don't mention it, or if they do what they say depends on the audience (i.e. if it is to a bunch of business men from Los Vegas, you bring it up as a solution to they water problem so to get they support for election, but in front of engineers and other people who have looked at the actual numbers you admit it is impossible).

The other great world wide irrigation plan is cheap and simple in terms of the above. All the Russian are planning on doing is diverting two rivers across a flat Plain (And pumping the water up a short climb). The Russians plan to divert the Volga and the Ob Rivers NOT moe water over or under them, and the water will flow over the Russians Steeps NOT pump up and over the Rocky Mountains.

Aral Sea diversion:
http://www.fragilecologies.com/oct09_95.html
$40 Billion dollar cost and this is through the flat steppes of Russia NOT the Rocky Mountains:
http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn4637-russia-reviving-massive-river-diversion-plan.html

Qattara Depression water diversion (For Electrical production only):
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Qattara_Depression
http://www.unu.edu/unupress/unupbooks/80858e/80858e0a.htm

Digging a 30 mile ditch between the Mediterranean and the Qattara Depression is dirt cheap, cost would equal about the cost of building the Panama Canal (Distance is about the same). Once the water hits the Depression, it can be used to generate electricity.

Dead Sea water Diversion, an another salt water diversion for Electric production (Cost only 2-4 Billion Dollars and only 120 miles):
http://www.american.edu/TED/deadsea.htm
http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2006/12/061214-dead-sea.html
http://www.mfa.gov.il/MFA/MFAArchive/2000_2009/2002/8/The%20Red%20Sea%20and%20the%20Mediterranean%20Dead%20Sea%20canals

[XemaSab]

9. You ever seen a canal siphon?

They can move canal water under existing waterways pretty easily.

Here in California, we've managed to get water over mountains pretty easily. We can get your water to California, don't worry. ;)

[happyslug]

13. The height the water has to be lifted is HUGE, over two miles high

The Russian Plan would cost $40-80 Billion Dollars (and that using Russian workers who are cheaper then US Workers, build on some pre-existing construction done under Brezhnev in the 1970s and 1980s (before Gorbachev killed the project as to expensive). The big problem is NOT getting the lakes into the Mississippi or over the Missouri or Red Rivers, it is moving that water UPHILL from the Mississippi. The Mississippi meet the Missouri at St Louis. St Louis is 455 feet oboe mean sea level. Denver is 5280 feet above sea level, a climb of 4825 feet.

For more on St Louis:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/St._Louis,_Missouri

For more on Denver:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Denver

The south Plate starts at 11,552 feet above sea level
http://southwestpaddler.com/docs/splatte.html

The Rio Grande starts at 12,000 feet above sea level:
http://southwestpaddler.com/docs/riogrande_gen_info.html

The Colorado starts at 10,000 feet:
http://southwestpaddler.com/docs/coriver.html

More on Colorado Rivers:
http://southwestpaddler.com/indexCO.html

Given that all three Rivers start BELOW the height of the mountains separating them you are talking of moving water at least 12,000 feet up hill i.e. over two miles. Furthermore this is a CONSTANT lift, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, 365 days a year (366 in a leap Year). This is not the 400-500 Feet the Russian are thinking of with the Ob project, it is three times as high. Even some of the Russian think it might be cheaper to line all their irrigation ditches to reduce water loss then to build the canal they are thinking of. The cost will be huge, the operating costs almost as high. The better solution for the Southwest would be to buy up the Farmers' rights to the water and divert that to the cities. It would be a lot cheaper to do.

[thecrow]

2. And (from the article)

"The problem isn't the transfer, it's the introduction of the pollutant in the first place," said Chips Barry, the general manager of the Denver Water Department. Denver receives 45 percent to 55 percent of its drinking water through two tunnels that bore through the Rocky Mountains, releasing the water into the South Platte River before it is piped to the city. "In some cases, the imported water is cleaner than the water in stream in the first place."

Yeah I can't wait to ge up and make coffee out of some sewer water from some Godforgotten place. Why do we pay our communities to provide clean drinking water if NEW pollutants are now allowed to be introduced? Should we wait until somebody gets sick?
What if our water isn't being tested for a particular pollutant from another water source half a country away?

*... making you "safer" day by day.

[bbgrunt]

5. wtf???

[fasttense]

7. More deregulation because we know how well deregulation has worked so far

A few results of deregulation: ENRON, the housing crash, the credit crunch, outsourcing to India, in-sourcing to illegal workers, airline industries falling profits, falling wages and on and on....

[liberal N proud]

8. Another great regulation eliminated by a bu$h regime appointee

[navarth]

10. yeah, it appears that this is mostly about releasing waste water into clean waterways

I am rather concerned about stealing the Great Lakes ever since visiting Arizona, BUT: I know someone who is an expert in these matters and he told me that stealing the Great Lakes would be prohibitively expensive.

I can't help wondering just how prohibitive it might be in a future where a lot of people are thirsty...

First oil/energy wars. Then water/food wars. I can't help wondering.

[MadHound]

12. Great, clearing the way to continue watering the desert

How long are we going to continue this vain, and ultimately unsustainable pursuit of having massive, growing communities in an area that doesn't have anywhere near the carrying capacity. We're already sucking the Colorado River dry, to the point that there is virtually nothing when it empties out into the Pacific. We've already sucked down over half the reserve that was in the Ogalala aquifer, our largest aquifer that is vital for keeping the breadbasket of this country producing food. Now we're going to try and suck up water from somewhere else, like the Great Lakes, and transfer it out to the desert in a foolish and ultimately unsuccessful attempt at keeping massive human settlements out there.

Rather than wasting our water in this stupid, foolish and vain endeavor, we should realize that living in areas like AZ, NM, NV and southern CA is unsustainable, and resettle our population accordingly. Otherwise we'll all suffer trying to keep places like Las Vegas afloat.

[navarth]

15. That's been my concern too, but

I'm told that they'll get the water for those areas by desalinization.

[Earth_First]

16. Fantastic!

Green golf courses in the desert Southwest is a RIGHT!