Michigan Readies Launch of Freshwater Research Front

Great Lakes Research Center at MTU campus designed to spur collaboration

by Dave Dempsey
January 16, 2010

The Great Lakes have never been sexier. Ecologically, socially and politically, they’re on the tip of the tongue.

Artist’s rendering of the new waterfront Great Lakes Research Center at Michigan Tech. Courtesy Michigan Technological University.

Thwarting the invasive Asian carp, defending against water exports and winning $475 million in new federal money from the Obama Administration for Great Lakes protection were last year’s big headlines that will continue to play out on 2010’s front pages and Internet home pages.

But flying below the radar is yet another Great Lakes development with the potential to prove its historic importance. Work is being readied to build a new, state-assisted freshwater laboratory on the Keweenaw Waterway dividing Houghton and Hancock, adjacent to the campus of Michigan Technological University.

Approved by the Michigan Legislature’s Joint Capital Outlay Committee in the fall of 2008, the $25.3-million facility will go up on the waterfront next to the Michigan Tech campus in Houghton. Groundbreaking could occur this spring.

The state is paying 74 percent of the cost of the new research facility; MTU the balance. In a time of state budget austerity, the lab was one of the few capital outlay projects to get a check in 2008, and the school credits Senate Minority Leader. Mike Prusi (D-Ishpeming) and Rep. Michael Lahti (D-Hancock) with bringing home the bacon.

What are taxpayers getting for their investment?

Dr. Alex Mayer, director of MTU’s Center for Water and Society, says the Great Lakes Research Center is different from existing, well regarded Michigan higher education water labs and centers because of its interdisciplinary emphasis. It’s intended to provide a research home to ecologists, environmental engineers, chemists, hydrologists, microbiologists, economists, sociologists, atmospheric scientists and others studying a broad range of freshwater issues. Those include the impacts of climate change, spread and control of invasive species, restoration of aquatic and terrestrial ecosystems, water withdrawals, and persistent organic pollutants.

“The Center is going to house faculty and students from Michigan Tech, but also scientists from other universities, research institutions, and government agencies,” Mayer says. “We can collaboratively attack problems that are of interest to the scientific community and the public.”

“Speaking of the public,” he adds, “a significant portion of the Center’s space and activities will include outreach to K-12 and to the public at large. We want people to see the kinds of research we’ll be conducting and engage them in hands-on activities.”

Lake Superior
It makes sense that the new lab will also train its sights on Lake Superior, which contains 10 percent of the world’s surface freshwater. Although it’s the cleanest, as well as the largest, of the Great Lakes, it’s not untroubled. The frigid lake is warming faster than the air above it, leading to speculation that it’s a signal of climate change. A major warm-up of the lake would be bad news for the coldwater fish species that have adapted to the cold over millennia.

Lake Superior, largest and cleanest of the Great Lakes, is not without environmental problems of its own. Courtesy Michigan Technological University.

Superior has other mysteries to explore. Some tough toxic chemicals that are in decline in fish and wildlife farther south appear to be holding on, or even gaining in Lake Superior fish.

MTU engineering graduate Mel Visser, a retired Upjohn environmental manager and author of the book Cold, Clear and Deadly, published by Michigan State University Press, hopes the lab will be able to document and raise the visibility of how some chemicals build up at higher latitudes. Toxaphene, a pesticide long banned in the United States, contaminates Lake Superior fish well beyond EPA-set human health limits, while levels in the lower Great Lakes are significantly lower.

“This is one of those Great Lakes science questions that deserves a lot more attention than it’s gotten,” Visser says.

Other research topics the lab is expected to delve into include whether invasive species may thrive in a warmer Lake Superior, how loss of coastal and stream wetlands may be damaging the lake, and the impact of overfishing and reproductive failure of native fish stocks.

Blue-Water economy
University officials also hope to tie the Center’s programming to water-related economic development. Michigan is moving toward a blue-water economy, and the Center “will play a vital role in helping the state understand and use its freshwater resources,” said Michigan Tech President Glenn D. Mroz. “It’s a strategic investment in the future.”

The three-story lab building’s design, the university says, will provide “a distinct and personal image for the Great Lakes Research Center.” It will house eight labs with researchers from four departments: biological sciences, civil and environmental engineering, geological and mining engineering and sciences, and chemistry.

Next to it is a boathouse — the seed of the original project that ultimately led to the facility — to support field research activities on Lake Superior and other bodies of water. The school’s Agassiz and Polar research vessels will be stored in the boathouse in the winter.

Dr. David Reed, vice president for research at MTU, calls the lab’s location a solid choice for several reasons. “Michigan Tech’s expertise across so many disciplines related to the Great Lakes makes it an ideal environment for the research, education and community outreach that needs to be done. And its geographic setting — on the Portage Waterway linking two sections of Lake Superior — is perfect, too.”

To be sure, the Center is more than a building. It’s also a dressing-up of Tech’s waterfront, which has been dominated for years by unsightly annex buildings and other structures.

“From the water side, there’s no indication that Michigan Tech is here,” said W. Charles Kerfoot, professor of biological sciences and director of the Lake Superior Ecosystem Research Center. Now there will be. The 49,000-square-foot glass building will glint in the summer sun and showcase the campus and its relationship to the environment.

Intended to walk the environmental walk, the building will be made of low-impact materials, have a green roof and rain garden to treat stormwater runoff naturally. Geothermal cooling and heating will help reduce energy costs.

What research conducted at the Center will ultimately turn up, nobody yet knows. But it’s clear the research lab will give vital education and experience to the next generation of Great Lakes protectors — who will need to be world-class to sustain the world’s largest freshwater ecosystem.

Dave Dempsey is the author of two books on Great Lakes protection, a board member of the Alliance for the Great Lakes and former environmental advisor to Gov. James J. Blanchard. He is communications director at Conservation Minnesota in Minneapolis.