Here is a primer, simplified for dummies like me, to understand the Everglades water storage problems, pollution and the sugar land buy.
Sugar cane fields drain off water and that water has high amounts of phosphorous in it. The water may have 100 parts per billion (ppb) of phosphorous which is a lot. The water goes into canals and is diverted into a stormwater treatment area (STA's) which are constructed wetlands. The STA's are shallow water bodies filled with plants that absorb pollutants and collect phosphorus-laden sediments. The plants absorb the phosphorous from the water so that when the water leaves an STA they are cleaned to a level between 15 to 25 ppb. The Everglades is a natural low nutrient ecosystem that needs water with under 10 ppb of phosphorous to thrive. Too much phosphorous and undesirable plants grow. The marshes do absorb even more of the phosphorous and we are getting pretty close. The problem is we don't have enough STA areas to properly clean the water and we need better best management practices for farms to reduce pollutants (BMP's). We also don't have areas for the reservoirs (artificial lakes) to store water in the wet season to be used in the dry season. A reservoir is a deep water body (100 feet deep sometimes) where phosphorous is not filtered out, however, water can be stored conveniently to be released when needed into an STA. Which brings us to the sugar land.
It would be useful to use some of the sugar land as water storage reservoirs and use the area where the Army Corps was going to build a reservoir (the Talisman land for instance) as STA's now. STA's are in short supply because of lack of land. You can just get so much water filtering out of the existing STA's. We need more of them which means more land. That is why buying the sugar land is such a good idea. The whole system would work better to help get the water going to the Everglades at the desired level of under 10 ppb. In a perfect world the reservoirs should be North of the STA's (upstream). With the sugar land this can happen.
Anyway, this is over-simplified but you get the drift. That is why most environmentalists are so happy about the sugar land buy. Not responsible for errors, this is my understanding of complex hydrology issues. I welcome corrections. Also, in comments I included the two Federal court decisions that came down this Spring on this very subject!!
7 comments:
I have frequently visited STA5 when it is open to the public for birding (there are also duck hunts there)and it is amazing to see how the STAs aggregate wildlife while also cleaning the water.
Don't they want to use the sugarland to create a sheetflow to the Everglades?
The Everglades have been sacrificed to fund the lifestyle of the Fanjul billionaires and Florida Crystals.
I thought I would include two articles on the two court decisions that came out this Spring about this VERY SUBJECT. Now you might be able to understand them better (this is Judge Gold, next one is Judge Moreno)
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
April 15, 2010
CONTACT: Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility (PEER)
U.S. Judge Threatens EPA With Contempt on Everglades
EPA Administrator Jackson Personally Summoned to Detail Pollution Compliance
WASHINGTON - April 15 - A frustrated federal judge stopped just short of a formal contempt of court finding against the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency for its failure to stem mounting pollution in the Florida Everglades. The court did suspend the State of Florida's authority to issue water pollution permits and ordered EPA to immediately undertake dramatic remedial action to reduce Everglades pollution levels.
The April 14, 2010 ruling by U.S. District Court Judge Alan Gold followed a contempt hearing into repeated violations by EPA and Florida's of a 2008 ruling by Judge Gold directing the agencies to comply with phosphorous limits for sensitive Everglades waters. In withering language, Judge Gold found EPA guilty of "dereliction of duty...contrary to the Clean Water Act" and -
* Ordered EPA to formally notify Florida that it is in violation of federal law and "establish specific milestones to ensure that the State of Florida does not continue to ignore, and improperly extend the compliance deadline for meeting the phosphorous...criterion in the Everglades Protection Area" (Emphasis in original);
* Suspended the power of Florida to issue any new water pollution discharge permits affecting the Everglades until EPA certifies the state is in compliance with the judge's order; and
* Required EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson to "personally appear before this Court on Thursday October 7, 2010 at 9:00 am to report to the Court on compliance with the order."(Emphasis in original)
Judge Gold is still holding in reserve whether to make a formal contempt finding, carrying civil or criminal penalties, against EPA and Florida.
March 31, 2010
Judge Moreno's findings:
By Paul Quinlan Palm Beach Post Staff Writer
The federal judge overseeing Everglades cleanup issued a ruling Wednesday that could be the death knell for Gov. Charlie Crist's controversial Everglades restoration land deal with U.S. Sugar Corp.
Chief U.S. District Judge Federico Moreno ordered that construction of a $800 million, city-size reservoir in the cane fields south of Lake Okeechobee must go forward, despite South Florida water managers' decision to cancel the project to free up money for the Crist land deal.
But in the nearly two years since Crist announced his plans to buy the U.S. Sugar land that environmentalists have long coveted, the governor has twice downsized the purchase to less than half its original size.
Moreno wrote that he is "now uncertain as to what role the downsized land purchase will play in Everglades restoration."
Attorney Dexter Lehtinen, who has argued for more than 20 years that the government should speed up restoration efforts, first as a U.S. attorney and now on behalf of the Miccosukee Tribe of Indians, cheered Moreno's order.
"He put Everglades restoration back on track, that's for sure," Lehtinen said Wednesday in response to the order.
The tribe, along with U.S. Sugar rival Florida Crystals, has argued that Crist's deal to buy 73,000 acres of land from U.S. Sugar for $536 million provides no clear or direct benefit to the Everglades and likely will delay cleanup for decades.
The South Florida Water Management District, the state agency Crist tapped to finance the land deal, halted the $800 million reservoir project in May 2008, eventually arguing that the reservoir property would be better used to create pollution-filtering marshes, given the availability of the U.S. Sugar land for water storage.
Everglades Foundation CEO Kirk Fordham reiterated that argument Wednesday, calling Moreno's order "one of many unfortunate chapters in the long history of Everglades restoration."
"I don't think this is a final decision on what will happen with the (reservoir) land," Fordham said.
Others also downplayed the ruling's significance. "Contrary to what our critics say, this does not preclude the state from purchasing U.S. Sugar lands that would allow for more effectively designed restoration projects," U.S. Sugar spokeswoman Judy Sanchez said in a statement.
The order nonetheless gives ammunition for Lehtinen and attorneys for U.S. Sugar rival Florida Crystals to take to the Florida Supreme Court on Wednesday, when they will ask the justices not to validate the bonds needed to pay for the sugar land.
The reservoir is one of slew of Everglades projects that had either been canceled or handed over to the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers so that the land deal could be completed. Lehtinen said that will only add decades to the cleanup effort. "If what they say is true, that they cannot do both, then they should not be doing the sugar deal," Lehtinen said.
In addition to potentially breaking up the sugar deal, Wednesday's ruling could also rekindle a lawsuit that South Florida water managers had originally blamed for shutting down the reservoir project. The Natural Resources Defense Council had sued to question the validity of the reservoir construction permit, saying there was no guarantee the water would go to the Everglades, as opposed to urban development.
Moreno wrote that there is "no reason to postpone that litigation" and referred the parties to a special master to "recommend realistic deadlines" for completing the reservoir.
"The time is now to go forward with the work that needs to be done on this project, which all parties agreed to be important," the order said.
From what I can tell everyone is concerned with the cost of this purchase, in a time when the state has no money.... but the way I see it is that Florida's future depends on it.
Someone should ask instead what would it cost us if we did not do this.
It is the cheapest way to solve a lot of issues at once. And Florida has a lot of issues that elected officials (Most) seem to turn the other cheek on. In one swoop this will help Estuaries by keeping harmful nutrient laden freshwater flows moving to the east, you will keep the pressure off the dyke, you will clean up water, Capture water in the wet season and store it to release in the dry season, push back on saltwater intrusion, reduce our dependence on groundwater and give the Everglades and Biscayne bay the water it needs to recover.... AND by doing all of this we will still have cheep water to drink and a reason for tourists to come here and for people to keep living here.
Simple as that…and I did not even mention the effects of sea level rise, the only plan we have other then changing our usage of fossil fuels and coming up with a greener economy is to push back on water with water and that is a quote from Katy Sorenson at the last Climate Task Force meeting.
This MUST be done and we really cant wait, so I think the Federal Government should partner on this deal as the states budget seems to be the problem with moving forward, not to mention the non willing sellers, condemnation for the benefit of the investments in the state would not be a bad idea. It would be better then subsidizing sugar, why are they doing so well…Use Agave to help save the Glades!
*****
The catch 22 of Everglades Restoration is when it was approved in 2000 by Clinton at the end of his term (CERP)... we moved into the Bush Era with plenty of money and no political will, now we have the political will and no money.
And people wonder why it is taking so long.... that is the reason in a nutshell...but now that we have the political will we must find the money, or the future for Florida looks bleak. We are already loosing people to other cities…. but maybe that is just poor planning.
This was pretty good - I actually understood it.
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