Regulating water withdrawals
The law, for instance, does not regulate water bottlers that pump less than 250,000 gallons of groundwater daily. It also presumes -- until the state develops a scientific formula to evaluate the potential impacts of water withdrawals -- that groundwater pumping will not harm trout streams if wells are at least 150 feet deep and 1,320 feet from the nearest trout stream.
The law also failed to protect warm water streams from harmful groundwater pumping until more sweeping regulations take effect in March 2008.
Critics said the law encourages companies to sink new wells as quickly as possible, before tougher regulations start to kick in next year.
"There is a potential for the equivalent of the California gold rush for water until that new (assessment) tool is in place," said Dave Dempsey, a policy adviser to the environmental group Clean Water Action.
State officials and a Nestle spokeswoman defended the law, as did some environmental advocates.
"The law was a great step forward in the protection of Michigan's water," said Bob McCann, a spokesman for the Michigan Department of Environmental Quality. "I think it's too early to say whether the law is exactly what it needs to be."
Nestle spokeswoman Deb Muchmore said the new law demands accountability from anyone that pumps more than 100,000 gallons of water daily. She said the law also provides information for the public about who is using water, and how.
"I think the law helps provide standards for us and helps address the public's questions" about water withdrawals, Muchmore said.
Nestle recently announced plans to pump 216,000 gallons of spring water out of the ground daily from a site in Osceola County. Because the company's well is 150 feet deep and more than 1,320 feet from the nearest trout streams, Twin and Chippewa creeks, the project is presumed to be harmless under the law.
Nestle voluntarily conducted a scientific study and concluded that pumping 70 million gallons of water annually from the Osceola County site would not harm Twin or Chippewa creeks. The state endorsed the project and said Nestle could pump three times more water without harming nearby streams.
Dempsey said he believes it is no coincidence that Nestle is seeking state approval for new groundwater wells now.
"What Nestle officials are doing implies they are racing to sink as many wells as possible before the tougher standards take effect. It's very alarming," said Dempsey, who was environmental adviser to former Gov. James Blanchard.
Nestle officials denied Dempsey's claim. Muchmore said Nestle has been studying the Osceola County well site since 2000 and the Newaygo County site since 2003.
"There is no rush by Ice Mountain to drill new wells," Muchmore said.
Nestle continues to be a lightning rod on the Great Lakes water withdrawal issue. The Switzerland-based company last year bottled 226 million gallons of water under the Ice Mountain label at its Stanwood facility, company officials said.
Sales of Ice Mountain water increased 17 percent in 2005 and Nestle reported sales of $253 million for that brand. Nestle plans to open another Ice Mountain bottling facility in 2009. That facility will be near Evart or Anderson, Ind., Muchmore said.
Critics of Michigan's water withdrawal law said it established a legal framework that encourages water bottling, a claim state officials and some environmentalists dispute.
The law was drafted by a committee that included representatives of Nestle and other water bottlers, government agencies, industry, agriculture and environmental groups.
Rich Bowman, a lobbyist for the Nature Conservancy of Michigan and the former executive director of Trout Unlimited's Michigan chapter, praised the law.
"The law isn't perfect, but our intention never was to prevent all water withdrawals," said Bowman, who helped craft the law. "Our intention at Trout Unlimited was to prevent anything that would harm our trout streams and hopefully that's what this law will do."
One environmentalist who worked on the law said it needs to be revised to prevent abuses by water bottlers.
At a minimum, the state Legislature should require any water bottler that pumps more than 100,000 gallons per day to obtain a permit, said James Clift, policy director for the Michigan Environmental Council.
"The 250,000-gallons-per-day limit for a permit was a compromise. The environmentalists wanted permits required at 100,000 gallons," Clift said. "Clearly, we support lowering the threshold."
Minnesota, which has one of the region's toughest water withdrawal laws, regulates all uses of groundwater that exceed 10,000 gallons per day or 1 million gallons per year.
Some environmental groups hope to persuade lawmakers to consider revisions to the law this year.
Bowman said there is no need to revise the law. "It's a good law," he said.
Urban sprawl and the paving of open space pose much greater threats than water bottling does to Michigan's surface waters, Bowman said.
"We withdraw billions of gallons of water in this state every day for a lot of different uses and we still have 12,500 miles of trout streams," Bowman said. "We could probably withdraw a lot more water and still have 12,500 miles of trout streams."
Critics of the state law say it failed to clarify the question of who owns the water in Michigan -- the state or private property owners and businesses. That oversight could allow Nestle or other companies to establish a claim of ownership to Michigan's water, which Dempsey said could open the door to water diversions to other states and countries.
The law also defined water as a "product" that could be shipped out of the Great Lakes basin, without constituting a water diversion, provided it was shipped out of Michigan in containers smaller than 5.7 gallons. That means Nestle or any other company could ship an unlimited amount of bottled water anywhere in the world, as long as each bottle was smaller than 5.7 gallons.
"Nestle's scientists say there is no difference between taking water out of a river system and using it to grow crops or for bottled water," Dempsey said. "What's the scientific difference between piping water out of the Great Lakes, hauling it out in million-gallon containers, five-gallon containers or 20-ounce bottles? There is no difference."