News

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has proposed tough new measures to reduce the health toll from air pollution around the Great Lakes by forcing lake freighters to stop burning dirty bunker fuel. More...

Illinois American Water, which provides water and sewer service to more than 10,000 customers in Homer Glen, Orland Hills and other Southland communities, is asking for a 30 percent increase in water rates and 51 percent increase in sewer rates. More...

The well water flowing into your kitchen sink, country club or mobile home park may not be as clean as you think. More...

Many contradictions are emerging as wind project proposals multiply like rabbits across Ontario -- hundreds, totalling more than 3,000 turbines and counting, several of them on the heavily protected Oak Ridges Moraine. More...

Ontario's environment ministry has given its blessing to a massive, controversial $550 million sewage line -- known as the "Big Pipe" -- that will open the door to billions of dollars worth of new development in the eastern GTA. More...

Three times in the last 15 years Frankfort water users have been asked if they wanted Lake Michigan water. Now, they are being asked again. More...

An audio scientist told an audience of Lake County public officials and property owners Wednesday that when we hear an unfamiliar sound that has a low tone, we instinctively feel threatened and want to get away. More...

U.S. Environmental Protection Agency Region 5 today withdrew its earlier objections to a 2007 version of Indiana's wastewater discharge permit for U.S. Steel's Gary Works. More...

Water levels in all of the Great Lakes are at least 1 inch higher than year-ago levels, according to a new report. More...

It's hard to believe that as many as three to four thousand ships are sitting at the bottom of the Great Lakes. "The Great Lakes is one of the best spots in the world to search for shipwrecks," according to Joel Stone, curator at Detroit Historical Society. More...

Economic development leaders from the Great Lakes Bay Region say the future of the emerging solar industry here can be described in one word: Opportunity. More...

BoatUS recently announced the "Keep America's Waterfronts Working Act of 2009," introduced in May by Rep. Chellie Pingree, (D-ME) and cosponsored by Rep. Lois Capps (D-CA). The legislation would allow local governments to use federal grant funds to purchase a threatened marina outright or a non-profit group could obtain a grant to buy development rights in order to keep a working boatyard in business, rather than see it sold for residential development. More...

With invasive species such as zebra mussels and Eurasion milfoil beginning to infiltrate inland lakes, concerns are growing among the county's inland lake property owners. More...

Each year, cargo ships traveling through the Indiana Harbor and Ship Canal stir up more than 100,000 cubic yards of toxic sediment that flows into Lake Michigan, according to a report by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. More...

So if some energy companies want to punch natural-gas wells deep into a shale formation in the Southern Tier, why does it matter in Monroe County? Think water. More...

A number of years ago, I ran into Jean Baptiste Perrault's 1831 map that Henry Rowe Schoolcraft used for a trip here that same year. On that map, Prairie Lake is labeled 'Lac la Folle au Fame'. More...

Wind farms in upstate New York are interfering with National Weather Service Doppler radars, making it more difficult to detect and assess approaching lake effect snow storms. More...

For years the promise of North America's first offshore wind farm has been just that - a promise. The reality has been a big disappointment: proposals pigeonholed by Bush-era dirty energy policies and NIMBY (not-in-my-backyard) opposition. More...

Daryl Kramp, Member of Parliament for Prince Edward-Hastings, along with Scott Reid, Member of Parliament for Lanark-Frontenac-Lennox and Addington, and Rick Norlock, Member of Parliament for Northumberland-Quinte West, announced today, on behalf of Canada's Environment Minister, Jim Prentice, $160,400 in funding for 4 projects to clean up the Bay of Quinte Area of Concern. Thirty-eight projects throughout the Great Lakes are receiving $2.2 million in funding this year from the Great Lakes Sustainability Fund. More...

Ducks Unlimited, the conservation group, has received $155,000 to fight phragmites, the invasive reed that lines much of Saginaw Bay and grows aggressively in other areas of the Great Lakes. More...

Consideration by the provincial Ministry of Consumer Services to change regulations regarding the scattering of ashes and other ritual offerings poses problems for the Credit Valley Conservation Authority, which fears for inland watersheds if the regulations are too slack. More...

So if some energy companies want to punch natural-gas wells deep into a shale formation in the Southern Tier, why does it matter in Monroe County? Think water. More...

A new report by the World Wildlife Fund released today says Canada's 10 most significant river systems will remain under varying degrees of threat unless a new approach to river management becomes widespread. More...

The Welland Canal is showing its age and in need of a makeover. A news reporter hopped on a bulk carrier for a lake-to-lake trip to see how canal boosters are trying to breathe new life into Niagara's defining waterway. More...

The Illinois River and other waterways have become infested with invasive Asian fish species, commonly called silver carp, which can turn a leisurely boat ride into the aquatic version of the running of the bulls. More...