Philippines’ President Gloria Arroyo declared a power crisis in the southern island of Mindanao because hydroelectric plants are providing only half of the electricity demanded in the area, the Manila Times reports.

“Capacities of hydroelectric power plants continue to be limited in Mindanao due to a very low water inflow to their reservoirs brought about by El Niño,” a spokesperson for National Grid Corp, which oversees electrical transmission, told the Manila Standard Today.

Luzon, the country’s largest island, is also starting to be affected by the drought. The Magat hydroelectric plant stopped operations on Thursday because of low reservoir levels, and several other facilities were forced to curtail operations, according to MST.

The capital city of Manila, which is located on Luzon, was subjected to hour-long rolling blackouts Thursday, as were cities in seven neighboring provinces.

To increase generating capacity, Arroyo would need Congress to pass a special resolution that grants her emergency powers through the Electric Power Industry Reform Act of 2001, which deregulates electrical supply.

Emergency powers would allow the government to lease large generating units and enter into short-term power supply contracts with two diesel plants, the Manila Times reports.

But some politicians say that government provision of electricity would be a regression.

The government should let private companies provide the power with rate regulation from the Department of Energy, Liberal Party campaign manager Florencio Abad told the Philippine Star. Others critical of the administration say the power outages are the result of Arroyo’s poor planning during her decade-long rule.

“This is criminal negligence,” said Sen. Benigno Aquino III to the Philippine Star. “We know that El Niño was going to visit the country. [The national government] knew that Mindanao was going to have a power supply problem. They should have mapped out a plan earlier on.”

Both the climatic conditions and the criticisms of the government echo the current situation in Venezuela. Reservoirs levels there have fallen to critical levels, causing power rationing and periodic blackouts.

Such risks occur when countries rely heavily on hydroelectric power without adequate backup generating capacity.

Source: Manila Times, Manila Standard Today, Philippine Star

Water Numbers: 5, 7, and 8: The report describes in detail seven different case studies and the eight-minute video features five California growers and water managers. The full report and the video (along with supplemental interviews, videos, an Executive Summary, and press release) can be downloaded from the Pacific Institute website at http://www.pacinst.org/reports/success_stories/index.htm. The five California growers and water managers in the video include: Karen Ross, the past president of the California Association of Winegrape Growers; Craig McNamara of Sierra Orchards; Dale Huss of Sea Mist Farms; almond grower Tom Rogers; and Panoche District Water Master Marcos Hedrick.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR:

Dr. Peter Gleick is president of the Pacific Institute, an internationally recognized water expert and a MacArthur Fellow.

Read his full bio…

Some flavor for these success stories? In Madera County, almond grower Tom Rogers has reduced water use by up to 20% in some fields with careful monitoring and irrigation scheduling. Dale Huss of Sea Mist Farms describes how they’ve become the world’s largest user of high-quality recycled water. Craig McNamara shows how innovative financing mechanisms, drip technology, and careful management has boosted yields while reducing water needs, as well as his efforts in public education and ecosystem restoration. Karen Ross describes the Sustainable Winegrowing Program that created a program to provide the wine and grape-growing industry with data to communicate their progress to customers and regulators and a mechanism through which their farmers can identify opportunities to increase efficiencies, manage risks, improve product quality, and cut costs. Growers are working with the Department of Fish and Game to manage some of California’s last remaining seasonal wetlands — the Yolo Bypass Wildlife Area, a critical habitat for migrating birds — while still maintaining crop production. The value of good information is demonstrated by the Coachella Valley Water District’s agricultural water-efficiency initiative, known as the Extraordinary Water Conservation Program, which documented savings totaling more than 75,500 acre-feet of water over six years.

And the report has much more.
This new Pacific Institute report highlights seven examples of innovations in agriculture that save water and provide multiple other benefits.

Photo Courtesy Pacific Institute

This new Pacific Institute report highlights seven examples of innovations in agriculture that save water and provide multiple other benefits.

With sustainable water policies and practices, innovative growers like these are moving California toward more equitable and efficient water management and use. “Mounting evidence of the effectiveness of farm water conservation and efficiency strategies is good news for policymakers and water managers,” said Dr. Juliet Christian-Smith, senior research associate at the Pacific Institute and lead author of the report. “Our study demonstrates that long-term sustainable use of water doesn’t require drastic advances in technology or heroic or extraordinary actions. It requires a commitment to sustainability and efficiency and the will to expand positive trends that are already underway.”

The cases in the Pacific Institute report and accompanying video demonstrate diverse strategies that can reduce pressures on scare water resources, effective planning and management practices, the role for technological improvements, the potential for using alternative sources of water, and the value of setting quantitative targets and providing financial incentives. The results are efficient water use or enhanced water quality, increased crop yields or quality, and multiple benefits for other water users, such as providing increased flood protection, drought-resilience, or habitat for wildlife.

The report offers several cross-cutting conclusions, including:

Managing for multiple benefits. Each of the case studies offers multiple benefits and collaborations among diverse sectors of the economy.

Accurately measuring and monitoring water use. The most significant improvements in efficiency require good information on water use, climate and weather conditions, and more.

Capturing the untapped potential of existing technologies. In recent years, California farmers have made progress switching to water-efficient systems for distributing and using water but much more potential remains untapped. No new magic technology needs to be developed.

Setting targets and providing economic incentives to accelerate progress. Several of the case studies show how quantitative targets and economic incentives can be effective tools to accelerate water management improvements.

These success stories are just a few examples of the innovations already occurring throughout California agriculture, with committed individuals and groups finding better ways to manage our state’s scarce freshwater resources. It is important to incorporate the lessons drawn from these case studies in future water policy and planning in order to accelerate the adoption of sustainable water management principles and practices.

Peter Gleick

Photo Courtesy Pacific Institute

This new Pacific Institute report highlights seven examples of innovations in agriculture that save water and provide multiple other benefits.

By Brett Walton
Circle of Blue

California’s agricultural system, which already faces numerous obstacles because of the state’s limited water supply, can be improved if farmers are given better information, clearer water reduction targets and more funding for programs that implement water-efficient technology, according to a report released Wednesday by the Pacific Institute.

The report, California Farm Water Success Stories, analyzes seven case studies of innovative farm management techniques used in the state. These case studies provide context for a 2009 Pacific Institute report that found California’s agricultural water use could be overhauled using existing technologies.

Supplying the right amount of water for agriculture in the state is difficult. Farmers waste water if they do not know how much or when the crops need it, while lengthy lag times between water orders and deliveries from the canals compound the problem. It takes water six days to travel the 453 miles between the Hoover Dam and the Coachella Valley Water District in southern California.

A key component of any water management upgrade is increasing access to accurate data, said Dr. Juliet Christian-Smith, a senior researcher at the Pacific Institute and lead author for the report.

“Accurate measurement and monitoring is a core principle for any system,” Christian-Smith told Circle of Blue. “It’s not happening statewide due to the lack of regulation of groundwater. For things we don’t measure directly we use proxy measurements. To make matters worse, agriculture use surveys are outdated, some more than five years.”

Christian-Smith pointed to the state-wide irrigation survey, which was last completed in 2001. While the state has ordered that on-farm irrigation techniques be assessed every 10 years, Christian-Smith argues that it is financially possible to compile data annually or bi-monthly. Collecting the data only costs $10,000, she says.

Two case studies from the report highlight the gains from improving the flow of information.

One study involves Tom Rogers and his brother, who are almond growers in Madera County, located in the center of the state. They use smart irrigation scheduling–a combination of weather station data, soil probes and devices that measure a plant’s water uptake–to help decide when to irrigate and how much water to apply.

Rogers estimates that this scientific approach has reduced water use by 20 percent in some of his fields, according to the report. Tracking weather patterns has been a key component to the conservation success.

Some farmers, like Rogers, operate their own weather stations, while the state also provides data through the California Irrigation Management Information System (CIMIS). The system tracks precipitation, wind speed, air temperature, soil temperature and humidity from 130 stations around the state. These variables, combined with specific crop information make irrigation more precise.

Yet Christian-Smith acknowledges that use of CIMIS is limited, with mostly non-farmers signed up for the service.

“We need to get the word out. We need to expand the system so it’s more applicable to regional variations–to specific fields and elevations.”

Meanwhile improving the communications system in the Coachella Valley Water District (CVWD) is the focus of another case study.

The CVWD moved from a radio-based system to a wireless system in 2005. The upgrade allows the zanjeros, who manage the irrigation canals, to deliver water to users with less waste. Orders are now documented instantly, which has lead to more accurate billing and fewer spills from releasing more water than was requested. As a result, leaks and other maintenance problems are also identified and repaired faster.

“The improved communications system has had more benefits than I can list,” said Eric Urban, zanjero supervisor at CVWD, in the report. “It used to be that when you were in the field, you wished you were back at your desk where you could look up information. Now, we can be in the field and behind the computer at the same time.”

Implementing these changes statewide will be expensive, but the money is potentially available already, Christian-Smith said. California will be voting on an $11 billion water bond in November.

The transition to more water-efficient farming techniques will save money in the long term, but significant immediate costs are often an obstacle. Installing drip irrigation systems can cost $2,000 per acre, the report states.

Federal, state and district funding programs exist, but high demand for the low-interest loans means most applications are rejected, according to the report.

Meanwhile the California water bond doesn’t identify specific projects, just general spending goals, Christian-Smith said. This makes it difficult to know if more money will be available to finance on-farm efficiency improvements.

“[Water management] is not rocket science. People have known about these techniques for a while, but there’s been no political will. It’s time we get serious about large-scale transition for water use, farmers and the environment.”

Brett Walton is a reporter for Circle of Blue. Reach him at brett@circleofblue.org. Read more on water problems in California here. Watch video interviews with Californian farmers and water managers from the report at the Pacific Institute Web site.

As many as half of the nation’s largest water polluters might be exempt from the Clean Water Act’s requirements because Supreme Court decisions never clarified what waterways the act protects, The New York Times reports.

Vague language has allowed certain companies to not be prosecuted, which could be contributing to rising pollution rates in the U.S. Thousands of known polluters have contaminated waterways by spilling oil, carcinogens and dangerous bacteria, according to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency officials.

“We are, in essence, shutting down our Clean Water programs in some states,” Douglas F. Mundrick, an EPA lawyer in Atlanta, told the Times. “This is a huge step backward. When companies figure out the cops can’t operate, they start remembering how much cheaper it is to just dump stuff in a nearby creek.”

The Clean Water Act is supposed to end dangerous water pollution by regulating every major polluter. But thousands of known polluters have skirted punishment because regulators lack or have difficulty obtaining jurisdiction, according to officials.

The EPA estimated that in the past four years more than 1,500 major pollution investigations have not reached fruition.

Regulatory ambiguity comes from language that limits the Clean Water Act’s jurisdiction to “the discharge of pollutants into the navigable waters” of the United States.  The Supreme Court has interpreted that language broadly to mean large wetlands and streams that are connected to major rivers.

Two court decisions have suggested that waterways that reside in one state are not covered by the act, although pollution within these bodies can still contaminate drinking water.

People who support the more narrow interpretation of the law argue that it helps scale back overreaching federal regulation.

“There is no doubt in my mind that when Congress passed the Clean Water Act in 1972 they intended it to have broad regulatory reach, but they did not intend it to be unlimited,” Don Parrish, the American Farm Bureau Federation’s senior director of regulatory relations, told the Times.

EPA and state regulators said that since the Supreme Court never defined what waterways could be regulated, judicial districts were left to interpret the court’s decisions on their own. Regulators struggle to determine how courts will rule.

Some EPA lawyers have established unwritten internal guidelines about avoiding cases in which proving jurisdiction is too difficult.

The EPA released a statement that says no significant water body is automatically excluded from the Clean Water Act, even streams that go dry for long periods. But mid-level officials interviewed by the Times believed up to 45 percent of major polluters were not sufficiently regulated.

Recent legislation in Congress tried to clarify some of the ambiguity, but opposing lobbying groups, like the Waters Advocacy Coalition, have stalled the bills.

As legislators and EPA officials pursue alternative regulations, state and federal regulators told the Times they cannot protect important waterways.

EPA reports state that about 117 million Americans get their drinking water from sources fed by waters that are in danger of exclusion from the Clean Water Act.

Source: The New York Times

Photo Courtesy NASA

Pictured above: A NASA radar image of ice collected in 40 craters on the moon’s north pole. Click to enlarge.

NASA announced yesterday that a moon probe discovered enough water on the north pole to potentially help generate oxygen or sustain a moon base, Wired Magazine reports.

India’s Chandrayaan-I lunar orbiter, which was carrying NASA radar equipment, found ice in 40 craters that ranged in size from 1 to 9 miles in diameter. Based on the discovery, scientists estimate that there are at least 600 million tons of in the area.

“Now we can say with a fair degree of confidence that a sustainable human presence on the Moon is possible. It’s possible using the resources we find there,” Paul Spudis, from the Lunar and Planetary Institute in Houston, told the BBC.

He added that new data from lunar missions in the past few months have revolutionized scientists’ view of the moon.

The ice had to be relatively pure and at least several feet thick to be detected by the probe, NASA officials said. The probe transmits polarized radio waves in which smooth surfaces return right-polarized waves, while rough areas return left-polarized waves. Afterward the probe detects a ratio, called the Circular Polarized Ratio (CPR), of returning left-polarized radio waves to returning right-polarized waves.

These north pole craters had a high CPR internally and a low CPR on their rim, a unique pattern which indicates ice enclosed in the craters rather than mere surface roughness.

“There’s not one flavor of water on the Moon; there’s a range of everything from relatively pure ice all the way to adsorbed water,” Anthony Colaprete, the mission’s chief scientist from NASA’s Ames Research Center, told the BBC.

Polar lunar ice comes from several sources, including interaction with solar wind, migration to the poles’ cooler temperatures, comets and asteroids.

Researchers also found a range of other compounds on the moon’s north pole, including sulfur dioxide and carbon dioxide.

As the results from the latest north pole exploration will be published soon, scientists are still analyzing tests from craters at the moon’s south pole.

Sources: Wired Magazine, BBC

A number of very simple, but important, water-using fixtures can be designed to work beautifully and yet save enormous amounts of water. That was the idea behind the water-efficiency standards that passed with the National Energy Policy Act of 1992 (yes, 1992!). That law put in place rules for manufacturers of toilets, showerheads, and faucets. And since those rules went into effect, a huge amount of water, and energy, and money has been saved.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR:

Dr. Peter Gleick is president of the Pacific Institute, an internationally recognized water expert and a MacArthur Fellow.

Read his full bio…

But like all rules and regulations, they are only as good as society’s willingness to follow them and government’s willingness to enforce them. Almost all of the major manufacturers have done a great job in producing high-quality fixtures that meet the standards. But a few manufacturers have flouted the law by either failing to ensure that their water fixtures met the national standards, or by failing to prove it to federal regulators. And until recently, federal regulators looked the other way, or didn’t look at all. (Of course, this isn’t the only instance of the complete failure of the federal government to enforce rules already in place to protect the environment, nor is it the most egregious). Five years ago, the Plumbing Manufacturers Institute, California Urban Water Conservation Council, East Bay Municipal Utilities District, and the City of Seattle notified federal and state agencies of independent test results for some commercial showerheads showing blatant violations of the National Energy Policy Act. Yet no action was taken at the time.

That is changing. A couple of weeks ago, the US Department of Energy’s Office of the General Counsel issued “Notices of Proposed Civil Penalties” to four manufacturers of showerheads for failing to certify that their products meet the standard flow rate of 2.5 gallons per minute. Unless the manufacturers satisfy the DoE within thirty days, the Department will file action either in District Court or with an Administrative Law Judge.

Water Number: $3,475,120. This is the total of the proposed civil penalties the Department of Energy will impose on these four manufacturers if they fail to certify that their products meet the conservation standards of the law. The cost to society in lost water, higher energy use, unnecessary greenhouse gas emissions, and money out of pocket for homeowners is far, far higher.

Why is this such a big deal, beyond the fact that the law is the law? Water-efficient fixtures save water, energy, wastewater treatment costs, water purification costs, and money for homeowners. When water utility demand is reduced by improvements in efficiency, new costly investment in water supply can be delayed or even prevented. And the numbers add up:

A ten-minute shower using a showerhead that uses 5 gallons per minute, as opposed to one that meets the standard of 2.5 gallons per minute, will use an extra 25 gallons of water. If you take a shower every other day, this could save as much as 4500 gallons of water per year. 4500 gallons would cost me around $30, including my water and wastewater and local sewer costs. But it would also cost me another $14 in natural gas costs just to heat that extra water. That’s around $44 a year in savings from an efficient showerhead, which typically costs just a few tens of dollars to buy and install. And these savings come year after year after year. And some of the showerheads found to be violating the standards used 12 or 13 gallons per minute, not just 5. [Another problem is plumbers and architects who are starting to install shower "systems" with multiple showerheads. Each single showerhead might meet the federal standard, but this loophole is certainly a violation of the spirit of the law.]

Multiply that waste over the population of California, or the United States, and the water and energy savings are massive. In the Pacific Institute’s 2003 report on the potential for urban water efficiency improvements, we estimated that if all remaining inefficient California showerheads were swapped out for water-efficient models, they would save 40 billion gallons a year now being used wastefully for showers. And some of the newest, well-designed showerheads flow at 1.5 gallons per minute — another massive improvement even over the federal standard of 2.5 gpm.

Some studies suggest that shower length can go up when low-flow showerheads are installed, though others actually have found a drop in shower duration. And no doubt some readers will complain about how crummy their showers feel. But well-designed showerheads, even low-flow showerheads, feel great. If you don’t like your low-flow showerhead because of the feel, get a good one and maintain it — the expense is small.

Here are some websites and groups that talk about the savings, review low-flow showerheads, or provide other useful water efficiency information:

Alliance for Water Efficiency

California Urban Water Conservation Council

Metaefficient (The Guide to Highly Efficient Things)

Flex Your Power

Peter Gleick

Jbhangoo / CC BY-ND 2.0

Pakistani officials raised concerns about India’s alleged misuse of the Indus River during diplomatic talks between the two countries Thursday, the Hindustan Times reports.

India denied that it has violated the Indus River Treaty and asserts that Pakistan’s water problems come from disputes between its own provinces, according to the Hindustan Times.

Officials came together to discuss terrorism in the region. The meeting between foreign secretaries was the first diplomatic talk the two countries have had since the November 2008 Mumbai attacks. The Indian delegation presented evidence to Pakistani officials that the attackers were based in Pakistan, according to the Guardian.

“India’s engagement with Pakistan will be predicated, as it has been since the Mumbai attack, on the response of Pakistan to our core concerns on terrorism,” said External Affairs Minister S.M. Krishna to the Hindu.

Yet Pakistan observers argue that the water issue is a recruitment tool for terrorist groups in their country. The leadership of Lashkar-e-Taiba, which carried out the Mumbai attacks, has warned that “Muslims dying of thirst would drink the blood of India,” according to the Hindustan Times.

While the U.S. has urged cooperation from both sides, it may be taking a more active role. Pakistan’s Daily Times reported that U.S. Special Representative Richard Holbrooke said the U.S. was mediating water negotiations between India and Pakistan.

A U.S. State Department spokesperson was not able to confirm or deny the claims, and asserted that the U.S. did not participate in Thursday’s meeting.

“Our position is we applaud the governments for holding talks,” the spokesperson told Circle of Blue. “This is an opportunity for exploring items on their agenda and a chance for progress to be made. The U.S. is not participating.”

Pakistan is concerned about India’s dam-building on rivers in the disputed Kashmir region. Under the Indus River Treaty, India is granted exclusive use of the eastern tributaries of the Indus, while Pakistan is given the western tributaries. India has been permitted non-consumptive use of the western rivers, hence the dams in Kashmir.

However, Pakistan argues that the reservoirs are larger in size than what the treaty designates and that India has not provided enough information about these projects.

Source: Hindustan Times, Hindu, Daily Times

Photos courtesy NASA

Pictured above: The view from space as a 965-square-mile iceberg broke off a branch of the Mertz Glacier in east Antarctica earlier this month.

A giant iceberg collided with a branch of the Mertz Glacier in east Antarctica earlier this month, breaking off a 965-square-mile ‘superberg,’ The Sydney Morning Herald reports.

Australian and French scientists said that the two icebergs could disrupt global ocean circulation currents, changing heat distribution patterns and lowering oxygen levels.

“The calving (break) itself hasn’t been directly linked to climate change but it is related to the natural processes occurring on the ice sheet,” Rob Massom, a Tasmania-based senior scientist at the Australian Antarctic Division and the Antarctic Climate and Ecosystems Cooperative Research Center, told Reuters.

This natural calving stands in stark contrast to the recent, rapid ice shelf break-off from rising temperatures in the Antarctic peninsula, according to Australian Antarctic Division Glaciologist Neal Young.

At 48 miles long and about 24 miles wide, the new iceberg holds roughly 20 percent of the world’s annual water use, Young told the Associated Press.

The two icebergs are now drifting together about 60 to 90 miles off the coast of Antarctica.

Scientists worry about global ocean currents because the newly-detached iceberg had previously helped protect a polynya, an ice-free area of water.

Twenty-five percent of Antarctic bottom water originated in the polynya, making it a key driver of ocean circulation, Massom told the Herald. If sea ice fills in the polynya, or if the ’superberg’ blocks it, the dense, cold sinking water could be cut off above the ocean floor, causing slow-ocean bottom currents. These ocean currents move heat around the world, and feed deep currents that distribute oxygen. Changes could have devastating effects.

“There may be regions of the world’s oceans that lose oxygen, and then of course most of the life there will die,” Mario Hoppema, chemical oceanographer at the Alfred Wegener Institute for Polar and Marine Research in Germany, told the Associated Press.

But the potentially dangerous oxygen-level variations also hold research opportunities.

Observing what happens “will … allow us to improve predictions of future climate change,” leading climate expert Steve Rintoul told the AP.

Sources: The Sydney Morning Herald, Reuters, Associated Press

Photo © J. Carl Ganter/Circle of Blue

Local and federal politicians that hosted an Asian carp conference in Michigan last month urged for immediate action against the Great Lakes’ threat. Officials demanded swift legislative action that goes beyond fiscal budget allocations.

By Steve Kellman
Circle of Blue

U.S. House Representative Dave Camp represents a legislative district that covers a huge swath of Michigan’s lower peninsula including the Leelanau Peninsula that juts into Lake Michigan. In January, the Michigan Republican introduced the Close All Routes and Prevent Asian Carp Today bill, also known as the CARP ACT, to the House.The proposal seeks to make actionable the legal motion filed by Michigan Attorney General Mike Cox to the U.S. Supreme Court in December. The Court rejected the motion to close canals and locks to the Great Lakes a month later.

In announcing his proposal, Rep. Camp noted that recent environmental DNA tests suggest that at least some Asian carp have already gotten into Lake Michigan.

Circle of Blue caught up with Rep. Camp earlier this month in Traverse City where he appeared with Attorney General Cox and other state officials during a rally to block the carp from entering the Great Lakes. Camp discussed his legislative efforts to stop the potential Asian carp threat from becoming a reality.

Can you describe the goals of your legislation?

What we want to try to do is keep the Asian carp out, and we believe that closing the canals and the locks is the first thing to do. Then we can address how to continue to operate barge traffic and recreation and other things. The concern is that the eDNA sampling results show that it may be too late. It’s important that we act and we act now, and we act decisively.

Your legislation, the CARP ACT, does have study and mitigation aspects?

It does. It’s about trying to find solutions to the concerns that the Chicago-and northern Indiana-area has raised. The main one we’ve [Michigan] raised is flooding. We want to make sure there are proper procedures in place so that homes and businesses don’t flood. [Closing the locks] is not a win-win for anybody, but I think it’s important that we do that.

Obviously they’re also concerned about any economic impact, but I think it’s important to get the information out about what the alternatives are. What actually is the level of barge traffic? What are the economic needs? How many jobs would be lost and what is the tradeoff? How does that compare to the potential job loss and economic damage if Asian carp were to get into the lakes?

We need to do some education. We need to make sure people understand what their choices are. We’ve gotten some attention with the new federal dollars we got from the appropriations process last year and from the president’s announcement recently. But it’s not just about dollars, we need some action. This is an issue that’s been out there for quit a while.

How long have you been working on this issue?

I really got involved in 2006 to try to get funding for the first electronic barrier and then we found out how inadequate that was and obviously there were some succeeding appropriations for other barriers. What really has been most troubling is it’s been a stop-gap approach, with no comprehensive solution or addressing of the concern. So while an electronic barrier is like sticking your finger in the dike, we really need to figure out how to design the berms, the locks, any sluice gates and any barriers. How do you look at the entire area and issue so that we can prevent Asian carp from getting into Lake Michigan?

There are two petition sites up now. Attorney General Mike Cox is behind one, and Michigan House Democrats have put up another one. Do you worry that the issue might become overly politicized?

I don’t think it is. I agree with Governor Granholm 100 percent on this issue. She’s called for closing the locks, so have I and so has Sen. Stabenow (D-Mich). Legislation is moving through Congress by a Republican in the House, a Democrat in the Senate, and with bipartisan co-sponsorship. I’m not too worried about Web sites and resolutions, although those are helpful. If we can reach people that check our Web sites, that can only help our issue. I haven’t seen their site, but I think the result is probably very similar to the result we’d like.

What’s your opinion of the Asian Carp Control Strategy Framework in general?

So far I think it’s been inadequate. There are several agencies involved and obviously there has to be coordination with state environmental offices as well. I don’t think the coordination has been good enough. I don’t think the agencies have really tried to, in a comprehensive way, address the problem. There’s been some good people working on it and they’ve taken it seriously, but we really need some direction from the top.

We just had a meeting, House and Senate members from the Great Lakes region, with the secretary of the Army Corps of Engineers where she was mispronouncing the names of the rivers. I asked if she’d been there and she said ‘no.’

I told her that’s part of the problem–we really don’t have people at the top levels taking this seriously, and making this a priority for federal agencies. We’re starting to get that attention, but we need to continue to push for it.

Steve Kellman is a reporter for Circle of Blue. Contact Kellman at steve@circleofblue.org and read more of our carp coverage here.