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.
Floods, droughts and major storms that wash out highways, damage buildings and affect power grids could cost Canada's economy $139 billion over the next 30 years, a new climate-based analysis predicts. The report, titled Aquanomics, was published Monday by GHD, a global engineering and architecture services firm. In an interview with CBC News, the firm's Canadian water lead Don Holland said that the value of water and the costs associated with it are underacknowledged.
McGill Bioresource Engineering Professor Chandra Madramootoo – a member of the steering committee of the Global Framework on Water Scarcity in Agriculture – expands on the theme of this year’s World Water Day: Valuing Water, and describes the goals of the federal government’s Canada Water Agency, which is in the process of being created. He is contributing to this effort.
