Illinois city plans to source its future drinking water from Lake Michigan

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The aquifer from which Joliet, Illinois, sources its consuming water is probably going going to run too dry to help town by 2030—an issue increasingly more communities are going through because the local weather modifications and groundwater declines. So Joliet eyed an enormous water supply 30 miles to the northeast: Lake Michigan.

It’s the second-largest of the Nice Lakes, which collectively present consuming water to about 10 p.c of the US inhabitants, based on the Nationwide Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s Workplace for Coastal Administration.

Quickly, Joliet residents will be part of them. After years of deliberation, their metropolis authorities determined final yr to switch the aquifer by piping it in from Lake Michigan, shopping for it from town of Chicago.

Challenge development will begin in 2025 with the intent to have water flowing to residents by 2030, mentioned Theresa O’Grady, an engineering marketing consultant working with town of Joliet. Joliet will foot the roughly $1 billion bill for the venture, together with the price to construct 65 miles of piping that may transport water from Chicago to Joliet and neighboring communities.

Not simply anybody can acquire entry to Lake Michigan’s pristine, saltless water. That’s rooted within the Nice Lakes Compact, an settlement that governs how a lot water every state or Canadian province can withdraw from the lakes every day. With some exceptions, solely municipalities positioned inside the 295,200-square-mile basin (which incorporates the floor space of the lakes themselves) can get accepted for a diversion to make use of Nice Lakes consuming water.

Joliet is a type of exceptions.

“I’ve seen occasional information tales about, ‘Is Kansas abruptly going to get Lake Michigan water as a result of Joliet obtained Lake Michigan water?’ We’re going above and past to display how a lot we respect the privilege we’ve got to make use of Lake Michigan water. We’re spending tons of of hundreds of thousands of {dollars} to be good stewards of that,” mentioned Allison Swisher, Joliet’s director of public utilities.

In April 2023, then-Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot signed an agreement with Joliet and 5 different close by communities to provide them with handled Lake Michigan water. Now, legal consultants and different Nice Lakes communities are left questioning how Joliet, positioned nicely exterior of the Nice Lakes basin, suits in.

The exemption within the Nice Lakes Compact

The Nice Lakes Area, which encompasses parts of New York, Pennsylvania, Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Michigan, Wisconsin, and Minnesota, in addition to the Canadian province of Ontario, is ruled by the Nice Lakes Compact, enacted in 2008.

“If you don’t dwell in a straddling neighborhood, otherwise you’re not a metropolis in a straddling county, you don’t have a ticket to the dance. You may’t even ask for a Nice Lakes water diversion,” mentioned Peter Annin, director of the Mary Griggs Burke Heart for Freshwater Innovation at Northland Faculty and writer of The Nice Lakes Water Wars.

“Except the state of Illinois,” he added.

The Chicago exemption, as it’s usually referred to, has roots within the 1800s, when animal waste from town’s stockyards would flush into the Chicago River, in the end pouring into Lake Michigan.

“That’s why Chicago embarks on this large Panama Canal-like water diversion venture, to take all that sewage and put it into this lengthy canal, which then would join with the Des Plaines River southwest of town, after which the Illinois River, after which the Mississippi River,” Annin mentioned, referring to the notorious reversal of the Chicago River. “Chicago’s resolution was to flush its rest room to St. Louis.”

On daily basis, Chicago had the correct to make use of billions of gallons of Lake Michigan water to divert this water and dilute the air pollution downstream. The state of Wisconsin began difficult the diversion within the Nineteen Twenties, arguing that Illinois’ superfluous water use was depleting water ranges within the lake. In 1967, the Supreme Courtroom sided with Illinois, and now, Chicago can do no matter it needs with its 2.1 billion gallons per day.

“So right here we’re in the present day with this actually type of unbelievable Joliet water diversion proposal,” Annin mentioned.