ANTIOCH – The Lake County Farm Bureau has awarded Friends of Catherine and Channel Lakes, a nonprofit group focused on improving the water quality in two of Illinois’ northernmost lakes, a $11,000 grant under the Illinois Farm Bureau Nutrient Stewardship Grant Program.
The grant will fund a biochar project to reduce phosphorus in the lakes.
“The Lake County Farm Bureau is proud to partner with Friends of Catherine and Channel Lakes on this exciting project,” Gregory Koeppen, Lake County Farm Bureau executive director, said in a news release. “Farmers are the original stewards of the land and we are committed to helping keep our waterways and lakes in Lake County healthy and thriving.”
Biochar is a highly adsorbent, specially produced charcoal created by heating wood or other plant material (biomass) with little to no oxygen. It is a key component in a carbon-negative strategy to resolve several critical current ecological challenges.
Biochar is loaded in porous bags and placed in a nutrient polluted lake. Natural currents will flow the water through the bag and biochar. Solids are physically filtered due to the jagged exterior of biochar. The physical removal of algae blooms and clay by biochar is very effective. Once toxic substances are attracted and bonded to the biochar walls, they are encapsulated and will not leave on their own. Thus, biochar attracts and traps suspended solids in the water column. Those pollutants are removed with the biochar at the end of its useful life.
Through the grant, Friends of Catherine and Channel Lakes will introduce biochar in 70 acres of the lakes, focusing on key inlets, tributaries and storm drains that carry phosphorus and other nutrients into the lakes from farmlands and surrounding communities. The organization also will engage stakeholders across both lakes to install biochar on their waterfronts (private docks) enabling the biochar to filter water around the perimeters of both lakes.
“We are squarely focused on improving the water quality in Lake Catherine and Channel Lake, and we are incredibly thankful to partner with the Lake County Farm Bureau,” said Amy Littleton, president of Friends of Catherine and Channel Lakes. “This biochar program will help us to take pollutants out of the lakes and reduce harmful algae blooms.”
In partnership with the Illinois Department of Natural Resources, Friends of Catherine and Channel Lakes has monitored water quality in both lakes on a monthly basis for multiple seasons. The group will continue to monitor the water quality in both lakes, measuring and reporting on phosphorus reduction, and will report on trends in clarity, dissolved oxygen and total suspended solids.
On July 19, the Lake County Farm Bureau in partnership with Friends of Catherine and Channel Lakes will host a Field Day event along the shores of Lake Catherine in Antioch. The goals of the event are to educate area farmers about the biochar project and to make connections among this group.