Numbers

The Five Great Lakes

• Lake Erie
• Lake Huron
• Lake Michigan
• Lake Ontario
• Lake Superior

How It's Used

"What makes the Great Lakes great? They are among the largest freshwater lakes in the world, with six quadrillion gallons of water. Here's a look at three homes for sale on three of the five Great Lakes."

"The measure, the Great Lakes Compact, was negotiated by the eight states. A decade in the making, it is intended to ease longstanding fears that states outside the region, or even other countries, could tap into the lakes, possibly deplete them and do long-term damage to their basin's natural environment and economy.

"Together, the five Great Lakes account for 20 percent of the world's supply of fresh surface water, and an estimated 40 million people get their water from the lakes' basin. Scientists and environmental advocates who backed the legislation said they considered the lakes not a regional resource but a national one, whose health and integrity, they said, are in the entire country's interest."

"A widely preferred and more permanent solution would be to have the Army Corps of Engineers build a physical barrier, at first with sandbags and later with soil, between the Des Plaines River and the canal. Authorization for the project was recently inserted in an appropriations bill that is working its way through Congress.

"Herbert Gray, the Canadian chair of the International Joint Commission of Canada and the United States,...supports building a physical barrier. 'The impact of the silver and bighead Asian carp on the Great Lakes would be an ecological disaster of international proportion,' he said, adding it would mark the end of both the commercial and sport fishing industries in all five lakes.'"

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