Researchers at the University of Illinois say they’ve determined pollution and invasive species can head in two directions depending upon Lake Michigan water levels.
Professor Marcelo Garcia and grad student Dongchen Wan used computer models to try to predict how water levels on the Calumet waterways would be affected by rises in Lake Michigan’s water, which in 2020 rose to its highest point in 120 years.
Garcia and Wang found that when lake levels are six inches below the Calumet system, water flows east toward Indiana and the Great Lakes basin.
When the lake level is 18 inches higher than normal, though, the flow reverses and heads west toward the Mississippi basin.
“State and federal agencies have made efforts to separate the Great Lakes basin and Mississippi River basin to control the spread of pollution and invasive species,” Wang said. “However, we can now confirm that water can flow freely … affecting an area much greater than originally understood.”
The study is published in The Journal of Great Lakes Research.
The National Science Foundation, the Texas Advanced Computing Center and the Metropolitan Water Reclamation District of Greater Chicago supported this research.
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