Significant Investments Work to Improve Michigan Water Quality
In partnership with: Michigan Department of Agriculture & Rural Development
Clean, fresh water is essential to life. Farmers are pivotal in preserving and improving Michigan’s water quality by responsibly managing their nutrient and pesticide runoff. They are committed to the stewardship of their land and water, and the Michigan Department of Agriculture and Rural Development guides them with science-based best practices and programs to protect Lake Erie and its watersheds.
To expand upon existing state water quality efforts, MDARD awarded the Alliance for the Great Lakes a $4.86 million grant to collaborate with MDARD on research and Michigan water quality monitoring. This project also leverages an additional $600,000 grant from the Erb Family Foundation.
This investment will help the state combat harmful algal blooms in the Western Basin of Lake Erie (WLEB). Lake Erie is particularly sensitive to algal blooms due to several natural characteristics, such as shallow depth, warmer temperatures, excess nutrients and human impacts. Data from this project will help direct the state’s plan for reducing phosphorus levels that contribute to algal growth.
“Understanding the impacts of conservation practice adoption on sub-watershed levels has been a point of focus and a specific driver of this project’s creation,” explains Dr. Tim Boring, MDARD director.
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A Novel Approach
Over the next five years, the Alliance, Michigan State University’s Institute of Water Research (IWR) and LimnoTech, an environmental consulting firm focused on clean water, will partner to monitor and analyze Michigan water quality in five WLEB sub-watersheds. This is a departure from previous monitoring of the WLEB, which has focused on areas closer to the lake.
“The project and monitoring efforts are a first step to getting a better, more comprehensive understanding of what is going on farther upstream,” says Tom Zimnicki, Alliance for the Great Lakes agriculture and restoration policy director.
Data throughout the project will be gathered, synthesized and interpreted to allow the partners to better understand the impact of nutrient transport factors like runoff and erosion on water quality at a more granular level. This information will help them prioritize and implement the most effective strategies to achieve their phosphorus reduction commitments.
“Rather than saying, ‘Well, we’ve always done it this way,’ we can take a step back to ask if the numbers support what we’ve been doing for years,” Zimnicki says. “The numbers will tell us if the path we’re on is working or not, and if it isn’t, how do we pivot?”
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High-Density Monitoring
To collect the necessary data, IWR and LimnoTech will deploy custom in-stream and agricultural tile drain sensors focused on the priority watersheds. Data collected will include stream flow, total phosphorus, soluble reactive phosphorus, turbidity and total suspended solids. Using novel approaches will lower monitoring costs while improving data.
“The high-density monitoring approach used in this effort, combined with customized sampling equipment, will provide some of the most robust water quality data to date in these sub-watersheds,” says Jeremiah Asher, assistant director at IWR.
According to Asher, IWR will incorporate the data collected into models currently being developed for MDARD to improve their predictive accuracy further and estimate nutrient loads within the modeled watersheds.
“By increasing monitoring capacity in the WLEB at smaller sub-watershed scales, with an emphasis on deploying higher spatial density monitoring instrumentation, this research will improve the understanding of the impact of various drivers on nutrient transport,” Boring says.
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A Plan for the Future
According to Boring, the information generated through this expanded Michigan water quality monitoring project will be essential for directing future resources to where the biggest problems exist.
“Together with partners, including Alliance for the Great Lakes, we’re building a solid foundation for ‘playing the long game’ when it comes to improving the health of the Lake Erie ecosystem,” Boring says.
Zimnicki agrees, stating that water is not only essential to life but is one of the core underpinnings of the local economy.
“We are in a really unique position in the Great Lakes,” Zimnicki says. “We have abundant access to water that, in some ways, is only as good as our ability to safeguard it. Through better research and understanding of what’s contributing to that pollution, we can preserve this resource for our generation and future generations.”
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