Minnesota River wins unpleasant national ranking

Minnesota River on environmental group's list of endangered waterways.

Last update: April 16, 2008 - 11:50 PM

An environmental advocacy group has ranked the Minnesota River fifth on a new list of the nation's most endangered waterways.

American Rivers put the 300-mile Catawba-Wateree River, which flows between North and South Carolina, at the top of its 2008 list. The organization chooses waterways from nominations made by environmental and river advocacy groups and bases the selections on the significance of a river as a resource, the level of the threat and pending decisions that could affect it in the next year.

In naming the 335-mile Minnesota River, which runs from the South Dakota-Minnesota border to St. Paul, the report cited the water drawdown that would be required for an expansion of a coal-fired power plant at the river's headwaters in South Dakota's Big Stone Lake and the potential for fish kills and other environmental degradation. Proponents of the plant say they would have safeguards in place to protect water levels.

Rivers on the list, in order, were the Catawba-Wateree River (Carolinas); the Rogue (Oregon); the Cache la Poudre (Colorado); the St. Lawrence (New York and Canada); the Minnesota; the St. John (Florida); the Gila (New Mexico and Arizona); the Allagash Wilderness Waterway (Maine); the Pearl (Louisiana), and the Niobrara (Wyoming and Nebraska).

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