Kristen Villebrun and Wendy Bush hoped they wouldn't have to pray for Chedoke Creek, but four years after they first raised alarm about the water's condition, they were part of an Indigenous full moon ceremony to do just that. About 50 people showed up near Princess Point on the dark and frigid Monday evening for the monthly ceremony, which was particularly special as it focused on Chedoke Creek. The body of water that runs into Cootes Paradise had about 24 billion litres of sewage and storm water runoff leak into it due to a gate being left open.
The Canadian Agri-Food Policy Institute is recommending that governments across the country develop a national plan to sustainably manage and use water for the agri-food sector. In a report released Monday, the institute called for ambitious commitments from governments and partnerships with stakeholders to prioritize the critical natural resource.
The Alberta Energy Regulator says it's looking for an outside investigator to dig into a release of oilsands tailings water that wasn't made public for nine months. In a statement released Tuesday, the regulator said it's seeking a "qualified, impartial, third-party body" to consider how it notified First Nations, governments and other stakeholders about two releases at Imperial Oil's Kearl oilsands mine north of Fort McMurray, Alta.
In 2015, the world committed itself to 17 global goals that became known as the Sustainable Development Goals with the intent of serving as a “universal call to action to end poverty, protect the planet, and ensure that by 2030 all people enjoy peace and prosperity,” according to the United Nations. Goal 6, which commits the world to ensuring the availability and sustainable management of water and sanitation, has been in the headlines ahead of the UN 2023 Water Conference which will launch the Water Action Agenda with commitments from countries across the globe to promote water security.
If you have spare land in Niagara in need of some trees, the Niagara Peninsula Conservation Authority (NPCA) is looking for you. “Trees for All” is an initiative that sees the NPCA partner with local community groups, environmental agencies and government organizations. Landowners can apply for the grant to help Canada reach its goal of planting two billion trees.
And yet these same grasslands support so much life. They help feed us, by nurturing pollinators and grazing mammals. They quench our thirst, filtering our communities’ drinking water with their roots. And they protect us, storing vast amounts of carbon and retaining water during spring melts and summer droughts. Our well-being is intimately tied to the health of the natural world around us. And we’re at a point now where nature’s health is ailing.
Perched over a harbour across from the bright lights of Vancouver’s city centre, a massive new residential development is pushing the boundaries of what it means to be climate resilient. The development, called North Harbour, is being built by developer Concert Properties in North Vancouver to a set of novel standards that will mitigate against sea level rise and storm surge.
The First Nation has long been among the most vocal critics of plans to build a proposed road that would connect the Ring of Fire mineral deposit to the highway networks and manufacturing might of Ontario’s south. Now, they’re working to start a sturgeon stewardship program in an effort to protect the fish from proposed development. Even with the most optimistic of estimates, shovels for the proposed Ring of Fire project are years away from going into the ground, but people in Neskantaga First Nation feel a growing sense of urgency.
News of the drying up of Lake Mead, the largest-capacity water reservoir in the United States, and the recent high-profile release of California’s strategy for dealing with the state’s growing water shortages are combining to raise questions of whether Canada will one day be exporting its fresh water south. The prospect of our water being exported in bulk to a thirsty U.S. neighbour captures Canadians’ attention. For one, the subject goes to the heart of concern about our national sovereignty. It is also a scenario that is readily and intuitively grasped: one can see in the mind’s eye Canada’s water flowing north to south — top to bottom on the map of North America — as if through some giant open tap, even though many cross-border rivers actually flow south to north.
The "U.S Point Of Use Water Treatment System Market 2022" report has been added to ResearchAndMarkets.com's offering. According to this report, Point-of-Use Water Treatment Systems market was valuated at $9.5 billion in 2015 and is expected to reach $15.6 billion by 2022. Water purification has become the need of the hour as UN records more than 4 billion cases of diarrhoea every year due with the major cause being water contamination. Health institutes, public organizations, governments and NGOs have been aggressive in promoting many of these water treatment systems particularly in the developing countries where access to safe drinking water is limited or scarce.
The massive floods in British Columbia in November 2021 demonstrated the devastation that natural disasters can cause in Canada. Prior to 2010, it was rare for annual insured losses from natural disasters in Canada to exceed $1 billion, but now insured losses of $3 billion are not uncommon. Canada is expected to become wetter, stormier, warmer and to experience more severe connective storms and wildfires. The Insurance Institute of Canada forecasts that annual insured losses could increase to $5 billion within the next 10 years.
Governments and U.N. agencies meeting at COP26 in Glasgow https://www.reuters.com/business/cop formed a water and climate coalition on Tuesday to address growing hazards and shrinking reserves. Led by the presidents of Tajikistan and Hungary, the coalition will seek to implement reforms which the United Nations' World Meteorological Organization says are needed in the global management of water resources.
Unprecedented changes are taking place in our rivers, creeks, and lakes. To ensure the long-term protection of our water sources, community-based water monitoring is becoming an increasingly important tool at local and regional levels. Water monitoring is used by governments and communities to assess the health of our watersheds and improve decision-making about our freshwater supply. Community-based water monitoring (CBWM) allows citizens to partner with decision-makers and work collectively towards watershed management.
The federal government and the Government of Newfoundland and Labrador have announced $5.4 million in joint funding for seven water and wastewater projects in communities on the Avalon Peninsula in Newfoundland and Labrador. In Holyrood, new funding will support the installation of a 500,000-gallon water storage tank as well as a new control system and watermains, stated a Jan. 14 release. There will also be watermain and related infrastructure improvements for the towns of Branch, Colliers, Ferryland, Harbour Main-Chapel’s Cove-Lakeview, and St. Mary’s. There will be storm and sewer pipe installation in Ferryland, as well as road upgrades where project work is being completed. As well, the town of Placentia will be served by a lift station and new sewage treatment unit.
ST GEORGE'S, NL, July 16, 2020 /CNW/ - The health and well-being of Canadians are the top priorities of the governments of Canada, and Newfoundland and Labrador. But the COVID-19 pandemic has affected more than our personal health. It is having a profound effect on the economy. That is why governments have been taking decisive action to support families, businesses and communities, and continue to look ahead to see what more can be done. Strategic investments in creating safe park spaces and a reliable water supply will play a key role in ensuring Newfoundland residents have modern facilities to support a healthy community.
Canada's old-fashioned city sewer systems dumped nearly 900 billion litres of raw sewage into this country's waterways over five years, enough to fill up an Olympic-sized swimming pool more than 355,000 times. Data posted in early February also show that wastewater-treatment plants across the country failed tests of their water quality thousands of times between 2013 and 2018.
Damage to Earth’s oceans and glaciers from climate change is outpacing the ability of governments to protect them, a new report from an international scientific panel concludes. “The capacity of governance systems in polar and ocean regions to respond to climate change impacts has strengthened recently,” says the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. “But this development is not sufficiently rapid or robust to adequately address the scale of increasing projected risks.”
The Columbia River Treaty, an international agreement governing the flow of water between British Columbia and six U.S. states, will be 55 years old this year. It has not aged well. The river springs from the Columbia Icefield in the Rocky Mountains of B.C. and winds 1,930 kilometres through the Northwestern United States – Washington, Oregon, Idaho, Montana, Nevada and Wyoming. No other river in North America spills more water into the Pacific Ocean.
