The U.S. EPA has announced a series of public input meetings related to $475 million in federal Great Lakes Restoration Initiative funds.  The nearest meeting will take place on August 3rd in Lansing.  I may try to attend the July 21st meeting in Milwaukee.  Link:

http://www.epa.gov/glnpo/glri/index.html

You can probably classify this idea in the category of “Not Likely.”  Still, Brian Mulherin of the Ludington Daily News reports that MI Natural Resources Commission member Frank Wheatlake is studying whether an annual weekend opener would be better economically and biologicially than the traditional November 15th firearms opener.  Read more at the link below:

http://www.ludingtondailynews.com/news.php?story_id=45148

All across Michigan, communities are rediscovering the natural environments that, in many cases, are the reasons for their existence.  Port Huron, of course, exists because it is the meeting-place of several major bodies of water.  Lake Huron, the St. Clair River and the Black River all have helped Port Huron become an important Great Lakes port of call.

And it was heartwarming to read a letter to the editor of the Port Huron Times Herald by a man who has now taken up the hobby of kayaking the Black River.  Read the letter at the link below:

http://www.thetimesherald.com/article/20090714/NEIGHBORHOODS01/907140318/Having+fun+kayaking+on+the+Black+River.+What+a+beautiful+part+of+the+world

The Detroit Free Press reports that a portion of the federal stimulus package will fund a new ferry terminal in Detroit.  The terminal will assist cruise ships that dock in Detroit, but also open the possibility of ferry service between the City of Detroit and other Detroit River or Lake Erie communities.  Link:

http://www.freep.com/article/20090714/NEWS15/90714056/Stimulus-cash-to-fund-Detroit-wharf–ferry-envisioned-

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Several weeks ago, the Governor of South Carolina, Mark Sanford, told his friends and associates that he would be hiking the Appalachian Trail and out of contact for the week.  Of course, we all know that Governor Sanford was off to Argentina to visit his mistress.  And the idea that he could keep a mistress secret was not the only ridiculous aspect of the story.  Even more ridiculous is the idea that you could hike the AT and expect to leave contact with the rest of civilization.

First off, there is a decades-long tradition of informal communication along the trail.  Comment books are placed at most campsites and trail heads.  Hikers use these to tell others of problem bears, mouse-ridden shelters and/or offensive fellow hikers. Hikers also take on trail names and dish dirt on each other during long-distance trail hikes. Each hiker gains a reputation. Some check in on others. In some cases, this trail communication helps the trail community to police itself and avoid encounters between incompatible hikers.  This system, alone, would have blown Sanford’s cover in just a few days.

But the advent of modern communication devices like cell phones and netbooks make the idea that one could leave the grid on the AT a fairly ridiculous notion.  Hikers on the trail sometimes have more technology than people sitting at home on the couch.  And this is good in many ways.  People get rescued by using cell phones.  Others are able to keep in contact with loved ones.

I bring this up because an interesting post passed through my Google Reader this evening.  It comes from the RSS feed of the Lansing Oar and Paddle Club.  Apparently, a member of the LOAPC is among a group that is paddling the Missinaibi River in Northern Ontario.  This is true wilderness.  Even places like Yosemite and Yellowstone have enough activity to make encounters with other humans likely during a weeklong trip.  That is not true of Northern Ontario.  I once waved to a man along the White River in nearby Pukaskwa National Park.  He had been paddling the river and had not seen another person in five days.

Still, the LOAPC has a post from a paddler on the trip.  That person used a satellite phone to help update the blog.  Even in the wilds, we are never really disconnected from the world.

Link:

http://loapc.wordpress.com/2009/07/14/liveblog1-missinaibi/

WTOL TV in Toledo has a good report about improvements in NW Ohio’s Swan Creek watershed.

Governor Jennifer Granholm announced the destruction of the State Historical Museum and Library yesterday.  Read the Detroit News link below:

http://www.detnews.com/article/20090713/POLITICS02/907130414/1409/METRO

There are few things that I love more than our national parks.  So, I just can’t wait until Ann Arbor filmmaker Ken Burns releases his miniseries about the National Park System this September 27th.  It will be fantastic.

The proposed climate cap-and-trade bill in Congress was always going to be difficult to pass.  Republicans just don’t believe in it.  And the negative impact of the bill on industrial states shears off important Democratic votes in the Senate.  The bill did gain passage in the House, but only by an anemic handful of votes.  And the Obama Administration returned home from a global climate change conference without an international deal of which the domestic climate bill would be a part.

So, as things stand, the climate bill is dead.  It needs 60 votes in the Senate.  And it isn’t even close.

There is, however, one way to change that.  And it requires supporters of the climate bill to embrace nuclear power.  The New Republic has a nice blog post that suggests a handful of Republicans might be willing to support the climate bill if its renewable energy requirements allowed inclusion of nuclear power.  Nuclear supporters are also looking for federal support for plant construction and more favorable regulatory rules.

http://blogs.tnr.com/tnr/blogs/environmentandenergy/archive/2009/07/10/is-a-little-nuclear-pork-worth-a-few-gop-votes.aspx

To me, the argument is compelling.  Nuclear power creates only minimal carbon emissions, mostly in plant construction and nuclear fuel extraction.  And although the storage of spent nuclear fuel is problematic, it is a manageable problem.  And the risks involved with nuclear pale in comparison to the absolute certainty of thousands of deaths from respiratory disease and mercury contamination that stem from coal power production.  And the need for large volumes of water in nuclear generation would place Michigan in a competitive situation.  We are certainly more capable of producing large amounts of nuclear energy than solar energy.

The big question is whether members of the environmental community can get past their reflexive opposition to nuclear power.  But, honestly, there will be no bill without a deal that includes nuclear power.  So, by ignoring nukes, environmentalists would essentially be embracing coal.  That would be irresponsible.  And it would call into question whether the environmental community really believes its rhetoric on global warming.  And it seems reasonable that if the Midwest is forced to give up its fossil fuel based industry, then environmentalists should be able to gore a few sacred cows.