An environmental colleague and friend sent out a report titled "State Of The Great Lakes" (SOGL). Depending on where you live it could be viewed as both good and bad news. There are multiple factors and criteria involved but the bad news for Woolwich Township and Waterloo Region is that of the five Great Lakes, Lake Erie is consistently in the worst shape of the five lakes. Why is this bad news? It is because our watershed and the Grand River all empty into Lake Erie. Also of course the Canagagigue Creek empties into the Grand River. The implications of this are that when both our agricultural and industrial colleagues have at last pooched our groundwater beyond the Region's ability to "manage" contaminated wells via musical chairs rotation of them or by drilling them deeper into less contaminated zones and aquifers; then at that point the clamoring for a pipeline will begin anew. Of course Waterloo Region will be limited to the one Great Lake within our watershed and that is, you guessed it, the least healthy of them all, Lake Erie.
Does any of this speak to greater effort to remediate the Elmira Aquifers from chemical pollution? Does it speak to still better efforts at keeping livestock manure out of our waterways? Does it also speak to where possible reducing salt useage on our roads? Finally it should also speak to cleaning up the Persistent Organic Pollutants in the Canagagigue Creek which remarkably are a significant problem in Lake Erie fish and sediments. Polycyclic Aromatic Hydrocarbons (PAH) and dioxins are getting into Lake Erie and Canagagigue Creek and Uniroyal/Lanxess are likely sources.
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