Sustaining Lake Superior

Sustaining Lake Superior

Author: Nancy Langston

Publisher: Yale University Press

Published: 2017-10-24

Total Pages: 311

ISBN-13: 0300231660

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A compelling exploration of Lake Superior’s conservation recovery and what it can teach us in the face of climate change Lake Superior, the largest lake in the world, has had a remarkable history, including resource extraction and industrial exploitation that caused nearly irreversible degradation. But in the past fifty years it has experienced a remarkable recovery and rebirth. In this important book, leading environmental historian Nancy Langston offers a rich portrait of the lake’s environmental and social history, asking what lessons we should take from the conservation recovery as this extraordinary lake faces new environmental threats. In her insightful exploration, Langston reveals hope in ecosystem resilience and the power of community advocacy, noting ways Lake Superior has rebounded from the effects of deforestation and toxic waste wrought by mining and paper manufacturing. Yet, despite the lake’s resilience, threats persist. Langston cautions readers regarding new mining interests and persistent toxic pollutants that are mobilizing with climate change.


Advice to Governments on Their Review of the Great Lakes Water Quality Agreement

Advice to Governments on Their Review of the Great Lakes Water Quality Agreement

Author: International Joint Commission

Publisher:

Published: 2006

Total Pages: 44

ISBN-13:

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Today, however, other concepts need to be incorporated into the Agreement so that it can facilitate contemporary efforts to protect and restore The purpose of the Agreement is to "restore and the water quality of the Great Lakes system and maintain" the water quality of the Great Lakes. [...] The following are four areas the Commission to the development of the Agreement in the 1970s suggests be considered for the purpose and scope and its amendment in 1987:. [...] For purposes of the Agreement, the Commission However, the Commission believes firmly that is of the view that a definition of the ecosystem adopting the ecosystem approach should not lead approach should be developed that is appropriate to to broadening the purpose of the Agreement. [...] This the objectives of the Agreement and the conditions means that the scope of the new Agreement - that in the basin. [...] Because the Commission basinwide consultations conducted by is recommending that the Agreement be endorsed the Commission, of the triennial progress by the U. S. Congress and the Parliament of reports under the Binational Action Plan, Canada, it is of the view that its role should be set out in a formal reference pursuant to Article IX of and (b) the Commission's independent the Boundary Waters Tr.


Evolution of the Great Lakes Water Quality Agreement

Evolution of the Great Lakes Water Quality Agreement

Author: Lee Botts

Publisher: Dave Dempsey Environmental

Published: 2005

Total Pages: 404

ISBN-13:

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Water quality concerns are not new to the Great Lakes. They emerged early in the 20th century, in 1909, and matured in 1972 and 1978. They remain a prominent part of today's conflicted politics and advancing industrial growth. The Great Lakes Water Quality Agreement, under the Boundary Waters Treaty of 1909, became a model to the world for environmental management across an international boundary. Evolution of the Great Lakes Water Quality Agreement recounts this historic binational relationship, an agreement intended to protect the fragile Great Lakes. One strength of the agreement is its flexibility, which includes a requirement for periodic review that allows modification as problems are solved, conditions change, or scientific research reveals new problems. The first progress was made in the 1970s in the area of eutrophication, the process by which lakes gradually age, which normally takes thousands of years to progress, but is accelerated by modern water pollution. The binational agreement led to the successful lowering of phosphorus levels that saved Lake Erie and prevented accelerated eutrophication in the rest of the Great Lakes ecosystem. Another major success at the time was the identification and lowering of the levels of toxic contaminants that cause major threats to human and wildlife health, from accumulating PCBs and other persistent organic pollutants