Proposal to ease pollution standards raises questions

Minnesota regulators are seeking easier pollution-control targets for Lake Byllesby and Lake Pepin, two popular recreation areas south of the Twin Cities slated for cleanup under the state's Clean Water Legacy program.

If the new targets are approved, those water bodies still will undergo major pollution-control efforts but would not have to meet the same standards as other deep lakes in the region.

This is the first time Minnesota has proposed special standards for specific water bodies.

An environmental group says that Lake Byllesby near Cannon Falls, Minn., would remain unacceptably marred by slimy green algae much of the summer, and that some polluters could end up getting a break.

"We do not want to swim in pea soup," said Kris Sigford, water quality director of the Minnesota Center for Environmental Advocacy, a St. Paul-based environmental group that has questioned the state's commitment to cleaning up algae-causing phosphorus in the reservoir.

Minnesota voters last year approved a 25-year effort to reduce pollution in 800 lakes and rivers, a massive effort that is costing nearly $50 million a year. In many places, the effort will mean stricter limits on discharges by wastewater treatment plants and new, government-funded programs to reduce tainted runoff from farm fields and urban areas.

It's unclear whether the lowered cleanup targets for Byllesby on the Cannon River and Pepin on the Mississippi River will mean less regulation of upstream discharges. State officials concede that the two water bodies would not end up pristine.

Unlike lakes, these two reservoirs have vast watersheds and challenging pollution problems, officials say.

"I don't think anybody is getting off the hook," said Steven Heiskary, a research scientist for the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency, which has proposed the changes. "There are going to be some dramatic [pollution] reductions that are made here."

He said site-specific cleanup goals are realistic, are supported by an advisory panel and are not part of a broad move to weaken environmental protections.

At Lake Byllesby, a 1,300-acre reservoir, the state's cleanup goal calls for reducing the smelly algae blooms to about a third of the summer.

That would be an improvement. The reservoir now blooms with algae more than half the time. A floating boom helps block the scum at a Dakota County park beach.

"When it's really bad, it is thick and it turns turquoise and it's scary," said Allene Moesler, who has lived on Lake Byllesby since 1991. Yet she has reservations about the cleanup goal. "If the lake is full of algae blooms 30 percent of the time, that's really not very good."

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency is reviewing the phosphorus standard and other cleanup goals for Byllesly. State officials have said they will seek a less-stringent phosphorus target for Lake Pepin, but have not submitted details to the EPA.

Lake high in phosphorus

Scientists say Byllesby's phosphorus is often more than three times the level considered acceptable for deep lakes in the Corn Belt. State officials have proposed that Byllesby be regulated more like a shallow lake, where higher levels of phosphorus and algae are allowed under state rules.

Even Byllesby's less-stringent cleanup target would require phosphorus to be cut by about two-thirds, experts say. Two large municipal wastewater treatment plants upstream of the lake already have committed to cutting phosphorus discharges, but the added problems of agricultural and urban runoff, which also are major sources of pollution, could take years to solve.

"I would love to see there be no algae blooms in Byllesby -- I am not sure it is physically possible," said Beth Kallestad, executive director of the Cannon River Watershed Partnership and a supporter of the cleanup target. "If we can get to 30 percent that would be a heck of a lot better."

Sigford, of the St. Paul environmental group, said that's not good enough. Byllesby, which has two parks and a Boy Scout camp on its shores, is supposed to be clean enough to support recreation such as swimming. She said that won't be accomplished if the EPA approves the state's request.

Effect on treatment plants

One concern, she said, is that because of the lowered cleanup standards, wastewater treatment plants won't ever face tougher discharge limits than those currently in place. MPCA officials denied any hidden plan to protect cities from more regulation, saying that treatment plants upstream of Byllesby potentially could face tougher regulation in the future.

This is not the first time regulators' efforts to protect the lake have been questioned. In 2002, state officials decided not to order two municipal wastewater plants to reduce the thousands of pounds of phosphorus they annually discharge into rivers above Byllesby. Sigford's group challenged the decision, and the state Appeals Court ruled against the pollution control agency. Later, Owatonna and Faribault agreed to upgrade their plants and reduce phosphorus discharges by 2011. The city of Northfield has installed the phosphorus treatment at its wastewater plant.

The EPA doesn't have standards for how much algae is too much for recreation. "Generally EPA tries to work with the states to identify what the public is willing to accept -- how frequently they are going to have algal outbreaks interfere with their recreational uses," said Brian Thompson, an EPA water quality official.

336 rivers, 510 lakes on list

The difficulties with Lake Byllesby highlight the challenges facing the state as it embarks on a decades-long effort to reduce pollution on 336 rivers and 510 lakes.

That effort got a big boost last November when Minnesota voters approved a 3/8 of 1 percent increase in the state sales tax over the next 25 years for the environment and the arts. Nearly $50 million a year is targeted to cleaning up lakes and streams -- a figure that officials say could increase in the future as work shifts from identifying problems to solving them.

At Byllesby, the solutions likely will mean a renewed push for soil conservation, wetland restoration and control of runoff from farms and cities.

"It is a long, long, tedious process," said Prof. Gyles Randall, a University of Minnesota soil scientist based in Waseca, Minn., who is not directly involved in the Byllesby effort. "It is going to be tough."

David Shaffer • 612-673-7090