Editorial: Keep new invasive species out of our vulnerable lake

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Updated: December 13, 2011 8:49AM

Over the decades, invasive marine species of all kinds have hitchhiked into Lake Michigan, carried in the ballast water dumped by oceangoing ships visiting Great Lakes ports.

Once here, they’ve killed or outcompeted native species, leading to degradations such as the slimy, smelly cladophora algae that now washes up and rots on Wisconsin shorelines.

About 180 invasive species infest the lakes, including quagga mussels, which have devoured so much plankton in southern Lake Michigan that native species such as freshwater shrimp — and the fish that forage on them — have declined precipitously. Zebra mussels, native to Eastern Europe, clog municipal and utility water intake pipes and cut the feet of beachgoers.

Since the St. Lawrence Seaway connected the Great Lakes to the Atlantic Ocean in 1959, about two-thirds of the alien invaders arriving here have been transported via ballast water. We don’t need more.

Unfortunately, a Coast Guard re-authorization bill scheduled for a vote next week in the U.S. House of Representatives contains a provision that would set weaker standards for treating ballast water from ships. The bill also would supersede regulations that the Coast Guard and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency have been preparing on treatment of ballast water. In fact, the EPA plans to unveil its proposal this month.

The Senate should reject the House plan and let the Coast Guard and EPA move forward.

Ships pump ballast water in or out of their hulls to keep their weight consistent as they load or unload cargo. Too often, that water transports organisms from one ecosystem to another.

Several years ago, the Coast Guard started requiring ships to flush their ballast tanks at least 200 miles out at sea, which provides some protection. No new invasive species are known to have arrived in the Great Lakes since then. But according to the Smithsonian Environmental Research Center, many ships still don’t flush their tanks. Given the risk of billions of dollars in environmental damage, stronger protection is important.

Alien species already cause an estimated $200 million a year of damage to the Great Lakes. A program just to control invasive sea lampreys costs $15 million a year.

The $33.5-billion-a-year shipping industry naturally is concerned about the cost of adding ballast-treatment systems, which could include a mix of filtration and chemical or ultraviolet-ray treatment. But the treatment should be part of the cost of shipping. Otherwise, the cost of environmental damage is pushed off on utilities, coastal industries, commercial and sport fishing and everyday citizens.

This is a perfect example of why government regulations can be necessary — to keep the costs of doing business where they belong.

Shippers argue there’s no off-the-shelf technology to meet stricter standards for ballast water treatment.

But environmentalists say industry will bring such systems to market once they know what the standards are.

On Friday, House Republicans shot down two amendments that would have allowed for more-stringent ballast water standards. To his credit, U.S. Rep. Robert Dold (R-Ill.) broke ranks to vote for the amendments.

Congress must protect the Great Lakes.

Because who knows what is hitching a ride in the ballast of the next ship steaming up the St. Lawrence Seaway?