State begins scrutiny of Waukesha's lake water request
Waukesha's application to buy Lake Michigan drinking water is "sufficiently complete" to begin a detailed analysis of the city's claim that it has no other reliable or sustainable option in the future, state environmental regulators said Friday.
The state Department of Natural Resources will publish a notice of its decision next week and schedule three public hearings on the application; one each in Waukesha, Milwaukee and Racine counties, said Eric Ebersberger, the department's water use section chief.
In a joint letter to several Wisconsin environmental groups, DNR Water Division Administrator Ken Johnson said Friday that the department expects to ask for additional information from the city as it studies environmental impacts of the application.
Waukesha has requested buying an average of 10.9 million gallons a day of lake water from one of three lakeshore municipalities: Milwaukee, Oak Creek or Racine. Maximum daily use might reach 18.5 million gallons a day in summer.
Water Utility General Manager Dan Duchniak greeted the state's decision on the completed application with enthusiastic approval.
"This is one more step in the process," he said. "We'll continue to work with the DNR as the application moves forward."
Thirteen months ago, Duchniak hand delivered the request to DNR officials in Madison.
Now that the DNR has deemed the application complete, the city's water negotiating team can begin bargaining with the potential suppliers, Duchniak said.
Community Development Director Steve Crandell and City Administrator Lori Luther will join Duchniak on the team approved by the Common Council last month.
Mayor Jeff Scrima had vetoed that makeup of the team in June in an attempt to add himself and three others: the city attorney, council president and a representative of the Town of Waukesha. The council overrode his veto on June 21.
In several months, if the DNR's analysis confirms there is no other reasonable water source available to Waukesha and the state approves the application, the city must have a purchase agreement with one of the suppliers in hand before the application can be forwarded to each of the other seven Great Lakes states for their approval.
Lake Michigan was selected as the best quality, most reliable and most affordable of more than a dozen surface and groundwater sources studied in the last decade, according to Duchniak. Those studies identified Milwaukee as the preferred supplier due to lower startup costs. It is closer than Oak Creek and Racine and total cost of the initial investment in pipeline, pumps and other facilities would be an estimated $164 million.
The city is under a 2018 deadline to fully comply with federal radium-safe drinking water standards. Each of the city's eight deep wells that draw radium-contaminated water from saturated sandstone would be abandoned if the lake water request is approved. Those deep wells provide 87% of the city's water supply.
Scrima has publicly stated his preference for using several surface water and groundwater sources close to the city -- existing deep wells with radium removal treatment, more shallow wells and wells built on the banks of the Fox River, the river and water stored in local quarries -- rather than the lake. Startup cost of this multi-source option has been estimated at $286 million.
Waukesha is the first community outside the Great Lakes drainage basin to seek a diversion of water under terms of a regional Great Lakes protection compact.
The compact would require Waukesha to return treated wastewater to the lake. The city has proposed discharging the water to Underwood Creek immediately south of Blue Mound Road in Brookfield. The creek flows to the Menomonee River, a tributary of the Milwaukee River, which empties into the lake.
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