[baystater]

CBS News Video - Top Stories and Video News Clips at CBSNews.com

Are you very concerned about Lake Superior's and the other Great lakes loss of water for the past couple of years? Or is it just a cycle?
What happens to Michigan if this water loss tread continues? What do you think can be done to fix the problem, if there is one?

And oh it take a second to load a video and there a 10 sec commerical before the story starts. Just to let you know.

[Driller1]

Some water loss in the lakes is due to city water. Many places are running it 50 miles from their city. There is pipelines large enough to drive huge semis though going to water plants. Is this the only reason? No, but it does have an effect.

[scottmi65]

I think it is a cycle. In the early 80's I remember people losing their houses because the water was too high.

[wolfcreek]

[suydam]

Your graph shows water levels through 1998.

The water has dropped (steadily) since 1998 without coming back up.

August water levels on Lake Superior were the all time low (look at the graph above, that's a precipitious drop in only 9 years from somewhere in the middle of the long-term range, to the absolute bottom.

The Georgian Bay Association did a relatively revolutionary study on the levels in Lakes Michigan and Huron. They found that while Lakes St. Claire and Erie are relatively stable over the past 30 years, Lakes Michigan and Huron have steadily dropped. Their assessment? A natural dam was removed from the mouth of the Bluewater River in the 1970s. Since then, the water flow from Huron into St. Clair has nearly doubled:
GBA Update Article Reprint- Water levels

I have yet to hear anyone refute this article. While it doesn't explain Lake Superior's levels, it's a logical analysis of the water levels in Lakes Michigan/Huron.

[Bydand]

Yeah I read a bit about that in the Ludington Daily news a couple of weeks ago. It said they were losing an additional 2.5 Billion gallons a day, on top of the 2.1 Billion gallons a day Chicago draws off for it's water usage. I think this is probably a portion of the problem, but not the whole thing. I mean the dredging took place mid-70's and we have had above water levels in the 80's. I cannot see where if this was the major problem, it would have taken 30+ years to show up.

[suydam]

Originally Posted by Bydand

Yeah I read a bit about that in the Ludington Daily news a couple of weeks ago. It said they were losing an additional 2.5 Billion gallons a day, on top of the 2.1 Billion gallons a day Chicago draws off for it's water usage. I think this is probably a portion of the problem, but not the whole thing. I mean the dredging took place mid-70's and we have had above water levels in the 80's. I cannot see where if this was the major problem, it would have taken 30+ years to show up.

I think (and I'm not the scientist who wrote the report for the GBA) their evidence is pretty compelling.

The big thing is that Michigan/Huron are dropping but St. Clair and Erie aren't. The lakes (Michigan, Huron, St. Clair, Erie) are heading toward equilibrium where they're all the same level. If you combine the above average precipitation and ice-pack from the 80s, the behavior matches predictions rather well.

At any rate, I think it's denial to think what we're seeing is part of the normal cycle. No maps of the normal cycle of water levels in the great lakes account for what we've seen the past 10 years.

[baystater]

washingtonpost.com (broken link)

Just keep a log on what's happening to the great lakes.

[suydam]

Here's a CNN video on the subject.
Video - Breaking News Videos from CNN.com

[Angel Bear]

Hmm, I wonder if it has something to do with global warming...I mean, "climate crisis" to be more politically correct

I'm sure when all of the ice melts north of us, that will more than fill it