The Great Lakes Blueprint

While the Great Lakes represent 20 per cent of the world’s freshwater, only 1 per cent of this water is renewed annually. This means that within the Great Lakes, 99 per cent of the water is non-renewable, a one-time gift from melting glaciers. Yet Canadians consume more water per capita than most countries in the world. Billions of litres of water are diverted from the Great Lakes every day by municipalities, industries, and agriculture, while dams and other physical barriers unsustainably manipulate the movement of water. Examples of large-scale manipulation of water flows include the dredging of the St. Clair River that has caused dramatic declines in water levels in the northern Great Lakes,²² and the Chicago diversion, which redirects nearly 3 million litres of water per second from the Great Lakes basin to the Mississippi river.²³ Management of water levels and flows must be improved. An integrated and precautionary approach must be taken in order to protect the entire system. Conservation efforts must be stepped up, including the identification and elimination of inappropriate and nonessential uses of surface and groundwater. Areas that require action include:

• Strengthen federal government standards and support for water conservation and water soft path efforts (eg. waterless systems, greywater recycling). Financial support for municipal and agricultural infrastructure renewal must be contingent on effective water conservation and efficiency plans. Universal water metering is a fundamental component of any effort to conserve water and must be a requirement for any federal funds.


• Working with provincial governments and municipalities, the federal government must develop a national model building code with improved water conservation and reuse measures at every stage of construction for all types of buildings, including single-family and multi-unit residential, commercial, institutional and industrial. Based on the new building code, governments must develop a strategy to address water inefficiency in older buildings.


• Municipalities must initiate full-cost pricing for water supply systems to encourage more efficient water use and generate funds for effective water management, such as source protection. It is important that low-income Ontarians are protected under any pricing system. An effective municipal price structure must be based on volumetric use rather than a flat rate and use an increasing block rate structure (where the per-unit rate charged increases with sequentially larger ranges of volumes used), rather than a uniform or decreasing block structure.


• Governments at every level should encourage the development of new and emerging products and services in agricultural, municipal and industrial sectors by phasing out outdated technologies (e.g., 13-litre toilets) and providing incentives for more efficient technologies. Invest in research for innovative technologies and implementation of strategies for behavioural change (community-based social marketing).


• The Ontario and Quebec governments must fully implement the Great Lakes St. Lawrence River Ecosystem Sustainable Water Resources Agreement, a bi-national agreement governing inter-basin water transfers. The two provincial governments must show leadership in the region to ensure out-of-basin diversions are prohibited with very strict exceptions.


• Governments must support and enhance the integrity and health of the headwaters to the Great Lakes and St. Lawrence River and institute strong land-use measures to protect the hydrologic integrity of the entire Great Lakes and St. Lawrence River ecosystem (e.g., the Greenbelt around Toronto) and adopt smart-growth strategies tied to hydrological carrying capacity. Nearshore areas, wetlands and tributaries under threat need to be identified, restored and protected in their natural state.


• The federal government must improve the understanding of the hydrological systems in the Great Lakes and St. Lawrence River ecosystem and the impacts of global climate change on these systems. Appropriate government departments must closely monitor and maintain inventories of water budgets, water takings, and the characteristics of aquifers. Research resources must also be directed toward understanding climate change impacts on levels and flows, and the cumulative impacts of takings and transfers.


• All levels of government must protect costal habitats and wetlands as natural and cultural heritage systems. This must include a revival of the heritage coast strategy for Lake Superior.


• Aging water infrastructure accounts for about one third of water wastage in municipal systems. Plans to replace this infrastructure over time must be required of municipalities and implementation enabled through funding by the federal and provincial governments.

References

[22] Georgian Bay Association. (2007). GBA News. Vol. 17, No. 2. Available at: www.georgianbay.ca/pdf/update/vol17no2.pdf.

[23] Lasserre, F. (2007). Drawers of Water: Water Diversions in Canada and Beyond in Karen Bakker (eds.) Eau Canada: The Future of Canada’s Water. (UBC Press: Vancouver).