For more than 80 per cent of Ontarians who get their drinking water from the Great Lakes, now is the time to think about Racine, Wisconsin.
It’s there that officials are considering whether to grant Foxconn, a major Taiwanese electronics company, access to water from Lake Michigan for the purpose of manufacturing LCD panels.
Or Wikwemikong.
Or Wasaga Beach.
The city of Racine has filed what’s known a diversion application — an official request to access millions of gallons of Great Lakes water per day.
Of that 7 million gallons per day, 4.3 million would be returned to the Great Lakes in the form of treated wastewater.
The decision to grant Racine’s request rests with the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources.
The international agreement that governs the use of Great Lakes water — the Great Lakes-St. Lawrence River Basin Water Resources Compact — allows communities that abut two basins to request water from the Great Lakes for areas that might fall beyond the dividing line.
No matter where these diversions are happening, they have an impact on the Great Lakes basin,” says Wilson.
A diversion request from Waukesha, Wisconsin, for example, was granted in 2016.