Great
Lakes
national
Program
&EPA
On the Web at:
www.epa.gov/glnpo
U,S. Environmental Protection Agency
Great Lakes National Program Office
Significant Activities Report
March 2003
IN THIS ISSUE:
• Toxics Continue Downward Trend
• Spring in the Air
• Legacy Act Prep
• Carp SWAT Team
• Watershed Leadership Academy
• Great Lakes Day
• Tracy Mehan Honored
Toxics Continue Downward Trend
A just-released report by the USEPA and
Environment Canada shows that levels of
the most critical, persistent pollutants
around the Great Lakes — including mer-
cury, dioxin, benzo(a)pyrene, and hexa-
chlorobenzene — continued to go down in
2002. According to the agencies' 2002
Great Lakes Binational Toxics Strategy Pro-
gress Report, these reductions are part of a
downward trend in toxic substances in the
Great Lakes over the last 15 years.
Since 1988, mercury emissions in Ontario
have gone down 78 percent. On the U.S.
side, mercury releases have been reduced by
40 percent since 1990. There was a similar
substantial reduction in dioxin releases on
both sides of the border since the late 1980s,
92 percent in the United States and 79 per-
cent in Canada. Since 1990, hexachloroben-
zene emissions went down 75 percent in the
United States and 65 percent in Canada and
benzo(a)pyrene went down 48 percent in
Canada and 25 percent in the United States.
Success in reducing these pollutants has
been due to a combination of stronger regu-
lations and voluntary actions. Some of the
voluntary projects undertaken in 2002 were:
• Industry phase-out of the use of PCBs.
Participating companies included Al-
goma Steel in Canada and Ford Motor
Co. in the United States;
• The "Burn-it-Smart!" campaign in On-
tario which promotes cleaner wood-
burning technologies, helping to reduce
emissions of benzo (a) pyrene; and
• The Burn Barrel and Household Gar-
bage campaign which educates the pub-
lic that burning garbage is a source of
dioxin and promotes clean alternatives
to this common practice.
Annual
Progress
Report
Great Lakes Binational Toxics Strategy
2002 Annual Progress Report
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March 2003
Significant Activities Report
!*90 ISM M01 2Mt
Trend in United States mercury emissions
from Great Lakes Binational Toxics Strategy
2002 Annual Progress Report
"The focus of this strategy is on pollution
prevention and voluntary efforts," said U.S.
EPA Great Lakes National Program Man-
ager and Regional Administrator Thomas
Skinner. "The key to success is working in
partnership with industry and improving
public awareness. We need more innovative
programs that offer incentives for those who
emphasize pollution reduction."
The Great Lakes Binational Toxics Strategy
is an agreement between Canada and the
United States to reduce or eliminate persis-
tent, bioaccumulative toxic substances from
the the Great Lakes basin. Environment
Canada, EPA, tribes, First Nations and other
government, public and private partners
work together toward that goal. 2002 marks
the halfway point in the 10-year timeline of
the strategy, which was established in 1997.
Level 1, or priority, substances identified by
the strategy are mercury, PCBs, dioxins/
furans, hexachlorobenzene, benzo(a)pyrene,
octachlorostyrene, alkyl lead, aldrin, diel-
drin, mirex, chlordane, toxaphene and DDT.
A copy of the Report, both in English and
French, can be found at www.binational.net.
Hard copies and CDs are available upon re-
quest.
(Contacts Ted Smith, 312-353-6571, smith.
edwin@epa.gov or E.Marie Phillips, 312-
886-6034, phillips.emarie@epa.gov)
Spring in the Air
With Spring approaching, interest in natural
or sustainable landscaping is on the rise.
GLNPO's Danielle Green gave presenta-
tions to two groups on landscaping that does
well with minimal use of resources (water,
fertilizer, pesticides) and sustains the natu-
ral ecology of the area through the use of
native plants.
Along with Dan Welker of USEPA Region
3, Danielle spoke on "Sustainable Land-
scaping, The Hidden Impacts of Gardens" at
the Smithsonian Institution in Washington,
DC on February 26th The presentation was
part of the Smithsonian's Horticultural Ser-
vices Division winter in-service training
program, Green and Welker presented in-
formation on the environmental impacts to
air, water, land and biodiversity of tradi-
tional landscaping and offered alternatives
such as using native plants in the landscape.
Their presentation can be viewed on
GLNPO's Green Landscaping with Native
Example of naturalistic landscaping
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Significant Activities Report
March 2003
Plants web site (www.epa.gov/glnpo/
greenacres/).
On March 6th, Danielle Green gave a pres-
entation entitled "Natural Landscaping" at
the Highland Park Community Foundation
workshop on ecological landscaping prac-
tices in Highland Park, Illinois. The work-
shop was specifically designed for landsca-
pers and included an open discussion with
city planners regarding development of a
new landscaping code.
(Contact: Danielle Green 312-886-7594,
green.danielle@epa.gov)
Legacy Act Prep
As featured in last month's issue of the Sig-
nificant Activities Report, the Great Lakes
Legacy Act of 2002 will provide greatly in-
creased resources and focus to the issue of
cleaning up contaminated sediments in
Great Lakes "Areas of Concern." GLNPO
has been given the responsibility of carrying
out the Legacy Act program. To ensure that
the program hits the ground running when
the first appropriations are made (expected
in October 2003), GLNPO has been active
in meeting with Great Lakes stakeholders,
briefing them on what to expect, discussing
potential cleanup sites, and listening to their
ideas on ways to make the program effec-
tive. GLNPO has now met with nearly all of
the Great Lakes state environmental agen-
cies and with the Council of Great Lakes
Industries. Upcoming meetings are planned
with environmental groups and other non-
governmental organizations.
(Contact: Marc Tuchman, 312-353-1369,
tuchman.marc@epa.gov)
Carp SWAT Team
GLNPO's Duane Heaton attended a meet-
ing in Chicago on March 12th to discuss
rapid response alternatives to keep the ex-
otic invader Asian carp from reaching Lake
Asian "bighead" carp
(photo courtesy of U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service)
Michigan. The carp are being held back
from migrating to Lake Michigan by an
electric dispersal barrier in the Chicago Sanitary
and Ship Canal. Meeting participants from
local, federal, state, and Great Lakes-wide
organizations agreed that if the bighead carp
should get past the electrical barrier, they
would reach Lake Michigan within 1 year at
the most. If the carp reached the confluence
of the Calumet Sag Channel and the Chi-
cago Sanitary and Ship Canal, which is ap-
proximately 7 miles upstream of the barrier
(toward Lake Michigan), it would be much
more difficult to contain them. Therefore,
the meeting focused on monitoring and
measures to keep them from reaching that
point.
The participants discussed the existing
monitoring programs for Asian carp in the
Chicago Sanitary and Ship Canal and how
that monitoring could be used to provide an
"early warning" that the fish had gotten past
the electric barrier. This was followed by a
discussion of possible rapid response ac-
tions should the monitoring show the carp
had breached the barrier.
See the May 2002, September-October
U.S. EPA Great Lakes National Program Office
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March 2003
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2002, December 2002, and last month's
Significant Activities Report for more de-
tails on the Asian carp and the electric dis-
persal barrier. (Contact: Duane Heaton, 312-
886-6399, heaton.duane@epa.gov or Marc
Tuchman, 312-353-1369, tuchman.marc@epa.gov)
Watershed Leadership Academy
Shoreline along Lake Michigan's Door County
The Lake Michigan Watershed Leadership
Academy was held March 12th to 14th on the
campus of Western Michigan University in
Kalamazoo, Michigan. The event was the
first time that the nine regional planning
agencies and councils of government have
met to discuss the state of Lake Michigan in
relation to their watersheds. The Lake
Michigan LaMP 2002 and results from the
Lake Michigan Mass Balance were pre-
sented. The audience of 75 were presented
with a number of new tools, including the
Lake Michigan on-line atlas, resource
poster, the Region 5 Critical Ecosystem
Teams Report, and the portal for the Great
Lakes Center for Environmental and Mo-
lecular Sciences (http://quickplace.erim.
org/gleams). William Painter from
USEPA's Office of Wetlands and Water-
sheds in Washington, DC and Tom Daven-
port from USEPA Region 5 provided train-
ing on the Clean Water Act. A number of
funding sources and successful projects
were presented as models including Chi-
cago Wilderness and the Coffee Creek Wa-
tershed Conservancy. The sponsoring part-
ners were GLNPO, the Northeastern Illinois
Planning Commission, Western Michigan
University, Great Lakes Commission, Lake
Michigan Federation, Lake Michigan Fo-
rum and Plan Partners.
Follow up to the Watershed Academy will
include local watershed meetings, a model
and GIS training session and reporting out
again at the State of Lake Michigan Confer-
ence planned for Fall 2003.
(Contact: Judy Beck, 312-353-3849, beck.
judy@epa.gov)
Great Lakes Day
March 20th was Great Lakes Day in Wash-
ington, DC. This annual event, sponsored
by the Northeast-Midwest Institute and the
Great Lakes Commission, consists of a
Congressional Breakfast, followed by an Is-
sues Briefing. The Congressional Breakfast
features remarks on Great Lakes issues by
Great Lakes Senators and Congressmen,
while the Issues Briefing allows time for a
variety of Great Lakes stakeholders to raise
significant issues to an audience of legisla-
tors, their staffs, and other interested gov-
ernmental and non-governmental Great
Lakes stakeholders.
GLNPO's Director, Gary Gulezian, ad-
dressed the Issues Briefing participants on
behalf of Tom Skinner, USEPA Region 5
Regional Administrator and Great Lakes
National Program Manager.
Gulezian first updated the group on Great
Lakes Strategy 2002. The Strategy was an-
nounced last April in Muskegon, Michigan.
It presents a vision for restoring and protect-
ing the Lakes. It identifies the major envi-
ronmental issues in the Great Lakes basin,
and it gives an overall plan for tackling
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Gary Gulezian
Great Lakes National Program Office Director
these issues. It also establishes common
goals for federal, state, and tribal agencies
to work toward. The Strategy is helping co-
ordinate and streamline the efforts of the
many agencies involved in protecting the
Lakes. And it is helping improve programs
that fulfill U.S. responsibilities under the
binational (U.S.-Canada) Great Lakes Wa-
ter Quality Agreement.
Developing the Strategy was an unprece-
dented effort, bringing together a partner-
ship of 13 federal agencies, the tribes, and
the Great Lakes states. The strategy con-
tains more than 120 specific, measurable
commitments by those partners. Those com-
mitments include reducing the concentra-
tions of toxins in fish, cleaning up contami-
nated sediment sites, de-listing Areas of
Concern, and protecting wetlands.
Gulezian then shifted to the main focus of
the presentation — the newly-passed Great
Lakes Legacy Act of 2002 which authorizes
a 5-year contaminated sediment cleanup
program for Great Lakes Areas of Concern.
Contaminated sediment is the main problem
at all 31 of the U.S. Areas of Concern and
sediment cleanups are needed to fully re-
store these rivers and harbors. Congress
laid the foundation for addressing contami-
nated sediments in passing the Great Lakes
Critical Programs Act of 1990, which au-
thorized a research and demonstration pro-
gram run by GLNPO entitled "ARCS,"
which stands for Assessment and Remedia-
tion of Contaminated Sediment. Over a six-
year period, this program developed sedi-
ment assessment tools to evaluate the extent
of the contamination, and also allowed test-
ing of some innovative treatment technolo-
gies.
The Research Vessel Mudpuppy, a ship spe-
cifically designed and outfitted to test sedi-
ment was built to support ARCS. T^heMud-
puppy has now been to almost all of the Ar-
eas of Concern. Using what was learned
from the Mudpuppy and working closely
with federal and state partners, nearly 2.2
million cubic yards of sediment have been
cleaned up over the past five years.
Gulezian called the Great Lakes Legacy Act
the next key step toward full cleanup of he
Areas of Concern, building upon the lessons
and tools of the ARCS program. Imple-
menting sediment cleanups through the
Legacy Act will help achieve the Great
Lakes Strategy 2002 goal of cleaning up all
31 Areas of Concern by our target date of
2025.
U.S. EPA Great Lakes National Program Office
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A wealth of information on contaminated
sediments, the Legacy Act, ARCs, and other
topics can be found on the Web at: www.
epa.gov/glnpo/sediments.html.
(Contact: Gary Gulezian, 312-886-4040,
gulezian.gary@epa.gov)
Tracy Mehan Honored
G. Tracy Mehan (right) receives Lake Superior award
from Steve Schlobohm in Washington, DC
Also on Great Lakes Day, March 20th, Steve
Schlobohm of the U.S. Forest Service met
with G. Tracy Mehan, USEPA's Assistant
Administrator for Water to present him with
some mementos to recognize his contribu-
tions to the Lake Superior Binational Pro-
gram. (Schlobohm is the U.S. Co-Chair of
the Lake Superior Work Group.) Before
coming to USEPA, Mehan had served as
the Director of the Michigan Department of
Environmental Quality's Office of the Great
Lakes. In addition to the engraved plaque
shaped like Lake Superior (shown in the
photo), Mr. Mehan was also presented an
"official" Lake Superior Binational Program
shirt and coffee mug.
(Contact: David Cowgill, 312-353-3576,
cowgill. david@epa.gov)
We welcome your questions, comments or
suggestions about this month's Significant
Activities Report. To be added to or re-
moved from the Email distribution of the
Significant Activities Report, please contact
Tony Kizlauskas, 312-353-8773,
kizlauskas.anthony@epa.gov.
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