Green Streets for Blue Waters is a collaborative effort to install curb cut raingardens and other stormwater management practices within public right of way and on private lands. The project development was funded by the City of Bloomington and the Lower Minnesota River Watershed District, who worked with Metro Blooms to identify the project area and goals.
Minnesota’s use of groundwater has increased over the last two decades. An increasing reliance on groundwater may not be a sustainable path for continued economic growth and development. The DNR is establishing three pilot groundwater management areas (GWMA) to help improve groundwater appropriation decisions and help groundwater users better understand and plan for future groundwater needs associated with economic development.
This project will assess 4 lakes and 17 stream sites. The four lakes will be assessed for total phosphorus, chlorophyll-a, and secchi data by the HCWP staff. Staff will monitor East Twin, West Twin, West Solomon, and St. John’s Lakes for total phosphorus, chlorophyll-a, and Secchi disk readings. In order to obtain a sufficient dataset. Ten samples will be collected over 2 years. Water samples at 17 stream locations for chemical analyses, including intensive watershed monitoring sites and “non-target” sites.
The law also included a direct appropriation of $500,000 in FY2010 to Hennepin County for riparian restoration and stream bank stabilization in the county's 10 primary stream systems. The money is funding projects to protect, enhance and help restore the water quality of five streams and downstream receiving waters. Bassett Creek Plymouth Creek Nine Mile Creek Riley Creek Elm Creek
This project will support construction of three watershed framework models built using the Hydrologic Simulation Program FORTRAN (HSPF). These executable models will simulate hydrology at the subbasin scale. An HSPF model will be built for each of three major watersheds: the Crow River/North Fork Crow River, the South Fork Crow River, and the Sauk River.
This project will finalize HSPF watershed model construction and complete the calibration/validation process for the following three watersheds: North Fork Crow River, South Fork Crow River, and Sauk River.
The goal of this project is to construct, calibrate, and validate a watershed model using HSPF. RESPEC will produce a HSPF model that can readily be used to provide information to support conventional parameter TMDLs.
The goal of this project is to continue and finalize Hydrological Simulation Program FORTRAN (HSPF) watershed model construction and complete the calibration/validation process for the Minnesota River–Headwaters and Lac qui Parle watersheds that can readily be used to provide information to support conventional parameter Total Maximum Daily Load (TMDL) reports.
This project will complete spatial and temporal revisions of 6 Hydrologic Simulation Program FORTRAN (HSPF) models, the recalibration and validation of 7 watershed HSPF models, and the revision of the drainage network and point source representation of the Pomme de Terre HSPF model.
The goal of this project is to extend the existing HSPF models through 2012 in the Chippewa Watershed (07020005) and Hawk-Yellow Medicine Watershed (07020004) to incorporate recent monitoring data to support current MPCA business needs and sediment source investigations.
Construct, calibrate and validate 3 Hydrologic Simulation Program FORTRAN (HSPF) watershed models for the St Louis, Cloquet, and Nemadji River Watersheds.
Construct, calibrate, and validate three Hydrologic Simulation Program FORTRAN (HSPF) watershed models that can readily be used to provide information to support conventional parameter Total Maximum Daily Loads (TMDLs).
Demand for Engineering services in Northeast Minnesota's nine-county Area III Technical Service Area is exceeding the capacity to deliver the needed services. There are increased requests from Soil and Water Conservation Districts for engineering needed to design and install Best Management Practices in part due to requests related to Clean Water Fund projects. These funds will be used to hire an engineer, which will increase engineering capacity and result in the completion of at least five additional projects per year.
The Minnesota River Basin Hydrological Simulation Program FORTRAN (HSPF) models simulate sediment erosion and transport, however these models periodically need to be adjusted to be consistent with the most recent sources of information regarding sediment distribution and loading rates. The goal of this project is to refine the sediment source partitioning and simulation in the Minnesota River basin using all relevant available sources of information.
The Minnesota River Basin Hydrological Simulation Program FORTRAN (HSPF) models, which simulate flow and pollutant transport, need to be refined to be consistent with the most recent external sources of land use, hydrologic response, and surface flow attributions. The primary goal of this work is to refine the hydrologic calibration in the Minnesota River basin.
Funding supports an Irrigation Specialist to develop guidance and provide education on irrigation and nitrogenbest management practices (BMPs). In this position, Dr. Vasu Sharma provides direct support to irrigators onissues of irrigation scheduling and soil water monitoring. She is collaborating on the development of new irrigationscheduling tools that help irrigators manage water and nitrogen resources more precisely. These tools help reducenitrogen leaching losses in irrigated cropping systems.
This project encompasses surface water quality sampling within the Snake River Watershed over a period of two years (2017-18). This is the cycle II monitoring as follow-up to the original Snake River Watershed monitoring 10 years ago as part of the Watershed Restoration and Protection Strategy Report (WRAPS). This project shall provide follow-up data on the waters in the Snake River Watershed in regards to changes in water quality over this 10-year cycle. The current sampling project will entail sampling 5 lakes and 11 stream sites.
The purpose of this work is to develop Total Maximum Daily Loads (TMDLs; a federal clean Water Act requirement) for streams and lakes in the Kettle River and Upper St. Croix watersheds. This and other technical information will be used to develop a separate report called a Watershed Restoration and Protection Strategy (WRAPS) report.
Starting in 2016 the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency (MPCA) will be collecting monitoring data on many lakes and streams in the Kettle River and Upper Saint Croix Watersheds. While this information will be useful to assess the overall health of the watershed, it will miss locations in the watershed that can provide critical information to local implementers, local governments, and citizens.
The Lac qui Parle-Yellow Bank Watershed District will contract with the Water Resource Center at the Minnesota State University in Mankato to complete a Geographic Information System (GIS) terrain analysis for the watershed. It will concentrate on the impaired reaches of the Lac qui Parle and Yellow Bank Rivers and tributaries. This inventory will utilize LiDAR elevation datasets to create many GIS datasets by spatially analyzing the elevation data.
The primary goal of this project is to partner with stakeholders in the development of a comprehensive Watershed Restoration and Protection Strategies (WRAPS) report to be used on the local level. Achieving this goal will require sound working relationships between local government units (LGUs), watershed citizens, and state and federal government. Gathering input from these groups will be critical when the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency (MPCA) drafts a WRAPS Report that can be utilized by local decision-makers.
The goal of this project is to establish load reduction requirements for impaired waters and to develop restoration strategies to improve water quality for impaired waters and protection strategies to maintain the quality of water for water bodies meeting standards.
The purpose of this project is to gain additional information about the amount of phosphorous flowing into Lake St Croix by implementing additional water quality monitoring and/or to reduce the amount of phosphorous entering Lake St Croix by the implementation of projects that will reduce phosphorus loadings. The St. Croix River Association (SCRA) will coordinate with a subgroup of the St. Croix Basin Water Resources Planning Team and other local resource experts on the identification and funding of comprehensive water monitoring and phosphorus reduction activities in the Lake St.
The goal of this project is to finalize the Lake Pepin Watershed phosphorus total maximum daily load (TMDL) report by using the existing information and documentation prepared under previous contracts to prepare one TMDL report that addresses the impairments on the mainstem of the Mississippi River. Information developed to date for draft TMDLs on the Minnesota River mainstem will be documented for later use by the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency.
The goal of this project is to reduce peak stormwater flow discharge, sediment and phosphorus from directly entering Lake Pepin by installing two stormwater infiltration basins treating a total of 15.8 acres of developed residential and commercial area in Lake City in conjunction with the Highway 61 road reconstruction project scheduled for 2020 reducing total phosphorus by 13 pounds per year and sediment by 2 tons per year.
The goal of this project is to support the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency (MPCA) in responding to public comments on the Lake Pepin Watershed Phosphorus Total Maximum Daily Loads (TMDLs), which were prepared by LimnoTech under previous phases of the project.
The consultant LimnoTech will support response to Total Maximum Daily Load (TMDL) comments the peer review process, United States Environmental Protection Agency and public notice. They will then revise the TMDL document as needed and attend internal and external project meetings.
The purpose of this project is to continue supporting the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency in responding to public comments on the Lake Pepin Watershed Phosphorus Total Maximum Daily Load (TMDL) study, which was prepared by LimnoTech under previous work orders.
This project will compile and review previously conducted studies and will prioritize best management practices (BMPs) based on a cost-benefit analysis of their pollutant load reductions and life cycle costs. It will also support the design and construction of BMPs, such as rain gardens and infiltration practices, within the Villa Park subwatershed of the Lake McCarrons watershed.
Lake Shaokatan and its 13.9 square mile watershed is the headwaters of Yellow Medicine River, which is one of the thirteen major watersheds in the Minnesota River and the largest watershed in Lincoln County. The primary land use is agriculture with the major crops being corn and soybeans. The trend for significant soil loss is due to the nature of the topography with the highest point in the Yellow Medicine Watershed in Lincoln County being 1,960 feet and the lowest being 1,160 feet, a drop of 800 feet in 25 miles.
The Riley-Purgatory-Bluff-Creek Watershed District and the City of Eden Prairie are working together to implement projects to remove Lake Riley and Rice Marsh Lake from the impaired waters list. One key emerging issue is to evaluate potential internal phosphorous loading within stormwater ponds in the lakes? subwatersheds. This project will also use updated pond data from the city?s intensive pond inspection program to identify other phosphorus reduction opportunities. The proposed assessment will quantify formerly undocumented P loading to Rice Marsh Lake and Lake Riley.
Faribault County Soil and Water Conservation District will develop two watershed plans using charettes, an intensive planning process used to engage citizens, conservation agencies, and others to collaborate on a vision for the development of a drainage watershed scale plan. The process allows landowners, producers, businesses, townships, cities and the county to partake in a comprehensive plan directly relating back to concerns and solutions related to surface water and nonpoint source pollution.
The goal of the Lake Volney Targeted Restoration project is to improve the water quality draining to Lake Volney, which is impaired for excess nutrients. The project contains eight priority areas and will install a variety of Best Management Practices, including stormwater basins, ag retention, wetland enhancement, and more.
The goal of this project is to prepare a draft Lake Pepin Total Maximum Daily Load (TMDL) Report. Lake Pepin is impaired by high levels of nutrients that cause excessive growth of algae.