AWS. Phase I of the project consisted of over 109 miles of tunnels and 2.3 billion gallons of stormwater storage.
Read more about the technology, progress, and benefits of TARP at MWRD.
- 1986: U.S. Environmental Protection Agency assigns secondary-use designations to much of the CAWS. This requires minimum water quality standards that protect for limited wildlife and recreation.
- 2000: Friends and partner organizations, Openlands and the Civic Federation, released Waterways for the Future, outlining how the Clean Water Act applies to the Chicago River, and how to use the law’s goals and legal protections for a cleaner waterway.
Read the full report, Waterways for the Future, on Openlands website.
- 2002-2007: In order to adopt stricter standards for water quality, officials must first upgrade water use designations by conducting a Use Attainability Analysis (UAA). At the time, the CAWS secondary use designation only protected limited contact with the waterway, and the law provided only broad water quality protections. The UAA demonstrated that the current use designation and water quality standards were not protecting the users of the river, such as kayakers and, in some instances, swimmers.
-IEPA filed a recommendation to update water quality standards throughout the CAWS with the IPCB.
-U.S. EPA: The Clean Water Act and the Use Attainability Analysis.
- 2011: U.S. EPA approves water quality standards submitted by the Illinois Environmental Protection Agency. After almost a decade of debate, Illinois adopted water quality standards to protect primary contact recreational uses of the waterway—such as kayaking and canoeing—on the North Branch, the Main Stem, the South Branch to Bubbly Creek, the Cal-Sag Channel and Calumet River.
See EPA's official statement on upgrading water quality in the CAWS.
- 2012: U.S. EPA completes its review of IEPA’s new and revised water quality standards for the CAWS and accepts all water-use designation upgrades. The Metropolitan Water Reclamation District of Greater Chicago begins the process of adopting disinfection technologies at its wastewater treatment facilities.
Read MWRD's statement on disinfection technology at the O'Brien and Calumet water reclamation plants.
- 2015: The IPCB accepted revised water use designations and standards for the CAWS. The following standards updates will have an immediate impact on the water quality of the Chicago River and the people, plants and wildlife that depend on it.
-Click here to compare the original and upgraded water quality standards for the CAWS.
-Click here to read all pollutants covered by the IPCB water quality standards.
Also in 2015, MWRD officially announced the successful installation of disinfection technology at the O’Brien and Calumet Water Reclamation Plants. In place for the 2016 recreational season, the disinfection technology eliminates harmful bacteria from effluent, making the Chicago River cleaner than ever before.