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North Dakota Seeks More Latitude to Drain Water From Devils Lake

Posted on: Wednesday, 24 May 2006, 18:00 CDT

By STEVE LAMBERT

WINNIPEG (CP) - The North Dakota Water Commission wants to operate its controversial outlet on Devils Lake more often - an idea that has heightened concerns in Manitoba about cross-border pollution.

The commission is asking the state Health Department to change the outlet's operating permit, which currently forbids it to be used when sulphate levels in the nearby Sheyenne River exceed 300 milligrams per litre.

The restriction has prevented the outlet, which is aimed at easing chronic flooding, from operating this spring and most of last fall.

The commission wants the sulphate limit raised to 450 milligrams per litre and says the higher limit does not threaten human or animal health.

"Sulphates will cause some taste and odour problems during the treatment process," Dale Frink, North Dakota's state engineer, said Wednesday from his office in Bismarck.

"But in itself, sulphates are not all that harmful."

The Health Department is expected to hold hearings on the issue in the early summer, and the Manitoba government is promising to fight the change.

"A state water commission that suggests right now that there should be any lowering of environmental standards at this current point is, I think, very arrogant . . . and absolutely unacceptable," Manitoba Water Stewardship Minister Steve Ashton said.

Ashton could not specify what harm higher sulphate levels might pose, other than a general "further degradation of water quality."

Sulphates occur naturally in the soil and in very high concentrations can act as a laxative. Fertilizer runoff from farmland can contribute to the problem.

Water drained from Devils Lake, which has no natural outlet, flows into the Sheyenne River, then into the Red River, which flows across the border and into Lake Winnipeg.

Manitoba and North Dakota were at odds over the outlet long before it was built last year.

The province at first expressed alarm about the possibility that invasive species of fish might make their way into the Red and crowd out existing species.

A study last year found there were no invasive species in Devils Lake, but also found fish parasites and aquatic plants that are not believed to exist in the Red River system.

North Dakota installed a temporary gravel filter on the outlet last summer, and the Canadian and U.S. governments agreed to develop a permanent filter with advanced technology.

That filter has still not been built, although the two governments are progressing toward an agreement on how it should be designed, Ashton said.

Manitoba Premier Gary Doer has asked North Dakota not to operate the outlet until the permanent filter is in place, while the state insists it must use the outlet to prevent further flooding around Devils Lake.

The lake has tripled in size since the early 1990s, swallowing farmland, washing out roads and forcing many residents to relocate.

The Manitoba government is also working on pollution problems that are much closer to home.

The province is helping the City of Winnipeg replace its aging sewer system, which is sometimes overwhelmed by heavy rains and allows raw sewage to spill into the Red River.

It is also developing new regulations that could limit industrial or farm activities near rivers and lakes.

Source: Canadian Press

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