November 20, 2009
November 20, 2009
LANSING - Governor Jennifer M. Granholm today congratulated the Michigan Department of Environmental Quality (DEQ) for receiving a 2009 innovations award from the Council of State Governments for its new water withdrawal assessment process. The program was developed as a result of legislation aimed at implementing provisions of the Great Lakes Compact and is designed to protect Michigan's water resources from excessive withdrawals.
"This award represents Michigan's commitment to developing new and innovative ways to protect our natural resources," Granholm said. "I congratulate the DEQ team on this recognition of their hard work and for demonstrating that protecting Michigan's environment can go hand-in-hand with making Michigan a great place to do business."
Michigan's water withdrawal assessment process requires any project that withdraws more than 100,000 gallons of water per day from Michigan waters to register with the DEQ to determine whether their proposed project could adversely impact the water resource. To avoid a burdensome permitting process, a Web-based screening tool was developed to estimate the impact of withdrawing water from a source on the surrounding ecosystem.
If the screening tool determines the withdrawal is not likely to cause an adverse impact, the user may simply register their withdrawal through the program and proceed with their project without further contact with the DEQ. If the proposed withdrawal is in a sensitive stream area or the tool indicates there is an increased likelihood of an adverse impact, the user is referred to the DEQ for a site specific review.
"This project was the result of a tremendous partnership between state and federal governments, our universities, and Michigan's business community in developing a real 21st century tool to manage our precious water resources," said DEQ Director Steven E. Chester. "I thank the staff of the DEQ who led this successful effort and truly earned this recognition."
The program became fully implemented in July and has already proven to be a success. The vast majority of users have been able to simply register their use and proceed with their projects, while those that have been referred for specific site review were successfully identified as situations where the project posed a risk to the ecosystem or the withdrawal was potentially too large relative to the available water supply. In those cases where a risk was identified by the screening tool, the DEQ worked with the applicant to modify the proposal to avoid the risk and allow the project to move forward.
The innovations awards program was established in 1986 to bring greater visibility to exemplary state programs and practices throughout the country. The award program highlights new state programs that find creative and effective solutions that address a significant regional issue.
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