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Chicago Needs $18B and 25 Years to Stop Invasive Species
Blocking Asian carp from invading the Great Lakes could require an engineering marvel that rivals the reversal of the Chicago River more than a century ago, according to a new federal study.Among the options outlined Monday by the Army Corps of Engineers to thwart the voracious fish from spreading is permanently separating Lake Michigan from the river and its connected waterways. Such a project would restore the once natural divide between the Great Lakes and rivers southwest of Chicago that drain into the Mississippi River. I like restoring the natural way of things, if you've got the money. Especially considering the natural divide was eliminated so Chicago sewage would flow to St. Louis instead of the Lake, which was/is the source of the City's drinking water. Chicago blasted through that hydrological barrier when it dug the Sanitary and Ship Canal and Cal-Sag Channel at the turn of the last century to divert the region's sewage away from its source of drinking water. It also created a shipping link between two of the nation's major trade routes. St. Louis, Memphis, Vicksburg, and New Orleans (and many others) got the poopy end of that deal. Get. Present tense. Two years in the making, the study comes amid a series of alarming findings that raise the possibility it might be too late for new federal action to stop Asian carp from getting into the Great Lakes and threatening the region's $7 billion fishing industry. Hmmm... $7 billion income divided into $25 billion cost... factor in union jobs, and the presidential legacy... Don't forget the envelopes filled with unmarked bills for all the pols... For many who have followed the issue closely, the findings confirmed their worst fears about Asian carp, which were imported to the United States in the 1970s to help fish farmers in the South clean algae from their ponds. The fish escaped during floods and have been eating their way up the Mississippi and Ohio rivers for years. Spawning populations are as close as 40 miles from where the Sanitary and Ship Canal spills into the Des Plaines River and flows into the Illinois River. Maybe the current freezing cycle of man-made global warming/climate change will stop the bad fishies. The upper end of the Great Lakes can get a bit nippy in the winter. With the Corps scheduling a series of public hearings around the region, the long-simmering and still-unresolved debate likely makes it more difficult for Congress to reach a consensus about what to do next. Took a lot of nerve for the reporter to mention Congress and consensus in the same sentence. It's easy to solve this problem, as the Instapundit has noted before: find a way to make the carp tasty. Market forces will solve the problem to the point that the EPA will eventually have to declare the carp an endangered species. Posted by: Bobby 2014-01-09 |
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