A recent report from the Large Lake Observatory of the University of Minnesota-Duluth caught my eye.  Tucked inside was a piece on observations of Lake Superior temperature trends.

The key finding was that traditionally frigid Lake Superior is in recent decades warming about two degrees F per decade compared with a warmup of one degree F in air temperature per decade. The explanation for the warming water appears to be a long-term trend of declining ice cover, which permits quicker and more pronounced warmup by sunlight.

Interestingly, higher winds, helping drive the surface layer deeper, may also be contributing.

It's not proof of climate change, but it's a sign of what could happen.  A warmer Lake Superior ain't the same Lake Superior.

In this timely and urgently needed commentary in the Muskegon Chronicle, Michigan State Rep. Mary Valentine takes on directly the misinformation spread about a bill she is co-sponsoring to protect the public interest in Michigan's water.

For months, special interests who stand to benefit from exploiting groundwater, lakes and streams and the Great Lakes themselves for private profit have unrolled a carpet of untruths to stop tht legislation.  This is not the place to dignify the falsehoods by repeating them.

The key points of Rep. Valentine's commentary:

It is and will remain James Rowens' The Political Environment blog.  Jim has the political experience and knowledge to understand the sometimes byzantine Wisconsin policy scene, and nowhere has he been better in investigating and commenting on an issue than he has with the unnecessary proposal by Waukesha to divert Lake Michigan water to fuel urban sprawl.

A ban on high-phosphorus household dishwashing detergents takes effect Thursday in Minnesota and five other Great Lakes states. It should help reduce phosphorus levels and algae blooms in the Great Lakes and inland lakes.

As someone who's used dishwashing soaps on and off for the last two decades, I can attest that there's been significant improvement in the effectiveness of low-phosphorus product over that time.  Our recent household use of Seventh Generation soap has proven it's as effective in cleaning dishes as (and maybe more effective than) the high-P brands sold by the big-name brands.

The comparisons of a real ecological catastrophe and a potential one affecting the Great Lakes from Michigan are beginning to multiply.  Now is the time to take action to prevent the latter.

Congressman Bart Stupak speaks here.

Publisher Phil Power speaks here.

From Washington, D.C. comes word that the U.S. Senate has finally confirmed Lana Pollack as one of three U.S. members of the International Joint Commission following her nomination by President Obama last winter.

As a longtime fan of Lana's during her three terms in the Michigan Senate and as a former employee of hers at the Michigan Environmental Council, I can assure anyone reading these words that she is not going to be a mere figurehead chair-warmer at the IJC. Instead, she'll ask tough questions, forge thoughtful policies, be accessible to citizens, and shun the platitudes that characterize much Great Lakes dialogue.

She also has an unparalleled ethic as a public servant and environmental champion.

My essays here must often seem churlish in light of the considerable progress made in the last five years of Great Lakes policy.  The 2004 conference on the Great Lakes hosted by philanthropist Peter Wege of Grand Rapids has blossmed into a $475 million new investment in the Lakes by the federal government. Congress has approved the Great Lakes Compact.  Public awareness of Great Lakes problems and protection is as high as it has been in years. All good news, all the result of hard work, particularly by Great Lakes advocates.  Let's celebrate that.

But has anything in the fundamental governmental or personal approach to Great Lakes protection changed, in ways that will have lasting value?