ISS 310 People and the Environment

Choffel 8

Ezekiel Choffel

ISS 310 People and the Environment

Mon-Wed 12:40-2:30

March 28, 2011

Pollution on the Grand River

Waterways have been one of the primary building blocks of civilization since the beginning of recorded history. The great civilizations of the ancient world were dependent on their waterways to pass goods and ideas from one area of their empires to another, in addition to providing water for crops and drinking these waterways provided a means for these people to understand their world. Today’s civilizations are equally dependent on their waterways to provide many of the same benefits. I am from Grand Rapids, Michigan, which is one of the many homes of the largest river in Michigan, the Grand River. Centrally located in downtown Grand Rapids, the Grand River separates the city into the Eastside and the Westside. During the lumber boom of the late 1800’s and early 1900’s Grand Rapids was the furniture capital of the world and for most of the boom all of the lumber that was needed to manufacture said furniture came to the city via the Grand River. Throughout the history of Grand Rapids the Grand has undergone many changes, for example the width of the river was cut in half in an attempt to cut down on log jams that would completely stop the flow of the river and make it impossible to extract the logs that were causing the stoppage. Shortly after the demise of the lumber boom a new problem arose, the industries created by the automobile factories would dump heavy metals and caustic chemicals directly in to the Grand as a way to rid themselves of their waste products. The Grand has undergone many transitions, between the heavy industry seeking a means to dump their wastes and conservation efforts by the local government and populations. During the 1980’s the pollution levels of the Grand reached their peak, at nearly every boat launch the garbage lined the shores and chemical slicks would swirl around any boat or animal that attempted to traverse the waterway. My Uncle Jim, who is an avid fisherman, once told me about how there were spots just past the city limits where you could light water on fire, which was, according to him, the last time he fished in the Grand. More recently there has been a large push to clean up the grand, to make it hospitable again and to remove as much of the pollution as possible.

Grand Rapids has been one of the leading cities in the country as far as water treatments go, being the first city in Michigan and the disputed first country in the nation to include fluoride in the drinking water. Similarly, much of the pollution of the grand went unchecked for long enough that by the time the problem was recognized the particulates per billion were out of control. By applying similar questions as William Cronon applied to New England, I will discuss whether or not the pollution of the Grand River was created by man or would have happened naturally, in addition, I will shed light on the current and past ecological preservation efforts to answer the question of the benefit or detriment of mankind on this vital river.

Any resident of Grand Rapids has heard the many different jokes pertaining to the Grand. Is it the Grand Toilet? The Grand Garbage Dump? For much of the 20th century these statements would be fairly accurate. The large scale pollution of the Grand began, as it does with most industrialized cities, when a large manufacturing base was established in the areas surrounding the river. In this case, as stated before, it was the manufacturing of furniture. The process for shipping large quantities of lumber from one area of Michigan to another was to use the various connecting waterways as a mode of transporting over 20 million trees a year. During the early lumber boom the Grand river served as one of two main lumber ports for the furniture industry, the other being only used for a very brief time was the Thornapple River which is a tributary of the Grand. By sending the massive quantities of lumber down Michigan’s rivers sediments of all kinds were dumped into the waterways, these sediments were estimated in 1935 to equal nearly a million years worth of erosion. According to early ecological researchers of the Grand, as found in The Story of Grand Rapids, These sediments created many problems within the ecosystems of the Grand by changing the depths of the river and disrupting natural habitats for the surrounding animals who depended on the Grand River for survival. In addition to increased sediment deposits, Industrial chemicals such as oil were also leaked into the rivers from the mills which would cut many of the trees in half for easier transport once they reached their end destination in Grand Rapids.

It doesn’t take much thought to realize that this polluting of the Grand River is humanly created. Rivers can handle natural erosion in most cases, but are unable to cope with the scale of erosion that can be created by industry. Complete river banks were destroyed in the process. Since the Grand runs East to West the devastation from the lumber boom is not as profound and long lasting as it is in many of the Northern rivers, but none the less there are complete sections of the Grand that have been re-routed by this erosion. As can been seen by the geological research of the Great Lakes Environmental Research Laboratory there have been trends of heightened sediment levels as far back 1864, but the highest per year increases between 1885-1895. There are no conclusions offered as to what the cause of these heightened levels are, but when one looks at the history of the Grand and this time also being the height of the lumber boom the conclusion can be draw that it was from increased human activities that the Grand River received its first large scale ecological attack from an outside source.

That is not to say the natural processes would not have caused erosion. Erosion would have happened either way, that is a given part of the Earth’s rebuilding processes. According to the natural geological impact of erosion would have eventually caused the same results, but the estimated time frame that it would take is approximately one million years, and that is considered by some geologists to be the low end estimated timeframe. (Kent 79-83)

The impact of increased human activity in the Grand Rapids region of the Grand was a direct cause of the increased erosion. Similar to the issues Cronon faced when looking solely at a before and after picture of the New England, it is impossible to look just look at the before and after of the Grand River Valley. The statistics and historical evidence involved are what makes the comparison possible. The Transport Mechanism for Catastrophic Rock Falls is a geological study, there is not enough text involved to be bias, there are not opinions, so unless the numbers are cooked and the organization that published the study did not catch or were colluding with the researchers, this article is credible and shows the increase of erosion in the Grand River Valley.

With nearly no time to recover, the Grand’s ecology was being attacked, this time with heavy metals and industrial chemicals. Grand Rapids has spent much of its history as an industrial center. While not as large as Detroit’s manufacturing capabilities, Grand Rapids manufacturing infrastructure is of a sizable enough size that pollution is a continuous issue. During the early 20th century and continuing until the 1980’s, the common protocol for industrial wastes that were perceived to be water soluble was to dump the chemical waste into the river, “where it would disappear forever.” (Chambers and Eadie 1-34) The problem was that this chemical waste did not disappear forever, in fact the pollution problem got so bad that by the 1980’s the fish that were caught from the river where contaminated beyond safe ingestion. An example of the contamination is the average mercury content of salmon caught for testing in 1976 was increased from years previous (Chambers and Eadie 1-34)Salmon were not the only fish caught in the industrial cross fire, steelhead and different trout species where among the other fish with abnormally high mercury levels.

One of the largest culprits of Mercury dumping was the plating industry. Based in the former “Industrial Section” of downtown there were once more than 15 different plating shops, all with drainage that led directly to the Grand River.

This is a clear example of humans negatively impacting the environment around them. It was known when the sewage system was established that eventually all sewage would end up into the Grand River or a surrounding tributary. The industry owners and workers were not directly to blame, many of the toxins and carcinogens that are known to be detrimental in modern society where unknown to have negative side effects. In addition it was believed that the water would purify whatever waste that was dumped into the river. (Schrauben) Now it is known that Mercury, for example, can potentially kill humans and at the very least it will stay in a human body the extent of their life. Based on the research, much of the ecological issues involving chemical dumping came about due to convenience and a lack of knowledge concerning the long term effects.

As outlined by the lumber example, it is additionally impossible to look solely at the before and after picture. Mercury is a naturally occurring element and there are trace amounts in most fish as Mercury is absorbed through the fishes skin, but the concerning issue with the fish studied in the 1981 was that the levels of Mercury contained in the fish were beyond the safe levels that one could expect to ingest and survive for very long. (Dolan and Yui 1-8)

The story does not end there for the chemical dumpers. During the 1980’s there was a push from the local population to clean up the Grand River. This push quickly turned into a movement which had much support and money backing it. Within two years the levels of Mercury had dropped by 5%, meaning they were close to edible levels. The Chemical industry, primarily the many corporate buys and sellers to GM, agreed with the populaces stance and made the technological changes to reduce overall emissions of toxic chemicals into the Grand. Today there are still instances of spillage accidents, but they are few and minor in scope compared to the dumping of the past decades. There remains sediment deposits of these dumped heavy metals that did not dissolve near Grandville, a suburb of Grand Rapids, and every year during the summer months this area is tested with gradually declining results. (Dolan and Yui 1-8)

As the late 1990’s closed a new problem for the Grand was discovered. The rain overflow was carrying a “large” amount of oil from the streets and parking lots. Grand Rapids has a water treatment plant that services the rain water and sewage lines from the city that was built during the 1980’s as part of the movement to clean up the river. About once a year, it rains enough that the treatment plant gets over flowed and different types biological wastes are spilt over into the Grand and eventually Lake Michigan. Compared to the spillage of the 1980’s the amount of waste that is released into the Grand are fairly minimal, displacing less than 1% of river water. ("City of Grand Rapids-Waste Water Plant ") In addition, before the water overflows it is at least run through most of the pretreatment process which includes UV light which kills nearly 90% of bacteria. The UV process does not attack or destroy non-living toxins such as trace pharmaceuticals, which have seen steadily rising contamination numbers, but as stated above most of the living organisms such as E. Coli are destroyed.

The water treatment plant of Grand Rapids is a open service where anyone who schedules an appointment is free to take a tour and look at the treatment processes themselves. The website for the treatment plant states that over the last five years the overall contamination levels of the grand have been dramatically reduced as a direct result of the treatment processes. The water treatment plant is a defined step in the correct direction. When dealing with the dumping concerns of the 1980’s many misnomers where circulated about the Grand River. As I made reference to the many jokes circulated about the Grand River in an earlier section, these jokes were true for nearly 80 years. It has been through the work of the treatment plant and other water awareness organizations to change the opinions about the pollution levels of the Grand by replacing incorrect information with current research which states that there has been a nearly 93% reduction in overall pollution in the Grand. ("City of Grand Rapids-Waste Water Plant ")

This is a case of old habits dying hard. The community and city have done their part to change its water use and water treatment practice, but the population is unaware of what these organizations have done. Most acknowledge that it is now safe to eat one to two fish a year from the Grand, but do not give and credit to the facilities that have made this possible. The Grand surrounding Grand Rapids has been a success story, with city leaders and community organizers advancing the work of water treatment by changing how the city manages its water treatment. The changes in organization alone have allowed the treatment plant to succeed because they are capable of changing what is necessary when it is necessary. Now, it is a matter of making the public truly aware of the changes in the Grand’s ecology, because most of the city dwellers are living in the past when the Grand’s pollution levels are concerned. It is not possible to light the water on fire, Nor will someone die from eating fish caught from the Grand’s many fishing holes.

There are still pollution concerns, like litter and plastics, that have not been addressed on such a large scale, but this is an example where the before and after approach is one of hope. The changes in toxicity levels and sediment levels have come from direct human interaction and involvement. The city of Grand Rapids recognized a problem in the Grand’s ecosystem and sought to right these problems. The work of maintaining a healthy river system is ongoing and changing with new technologies. Cronon’s questions of the spiritual and physical aspects of pollution remain solid logic when applied to the Grand, but this is a situation where the people have seen the devastation their actions have had and have changed them in response. In addition, Michigan has suffered a generalized similar situation as that faced by New England, both landscapes, and in the case of the Grand waterway, suffered directly from human actions. It has been through conscious raising of awareness levels that the Grand has been able to stabilize into a fairly healthy river. The studies conducted by the various sources used here have all been published to the public and the impact of rising public awareness has been directly beneficial to the establishment of clean water policies that have cleaned up the largest river in Michigan.