[getsmart-l] Canadians are notoriously wasteful consumers of water.

[John O'Gorman]

At the last Rouge Park Alliance meeting we were on the verge of talking about this because of the drying streams!

Let's begin with composting toilets, waterless urinals and, at least, low-flush toilets! If we use less then we will not have to build such large infrastructure nor drain our resources!!
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Water Woes:- The Crisis that No One Is Talking About

GARY MASON gmason at globeandmail.com 
VANCOUVER Globe and Mail Oct. 13/07

The only thing more depressing than lunch with Michael Byers is lunch with Michael Byers and James Byrne. 

Prof. Byers is Canada research chair in global politics and international law at the University of British Columbia. When he is trying to understand the complex combination of science, international law and politics that often are involved in major public policy questions of the day, he goes to people like Prof. Byrne, who provides the hard data around which these issues are framed. 

Today the three of us are talking about water, Prof. Byrne's specialty. He is a professor at the University of Lethbridge and one of the country's leading experts on water resources. 

He has been monitoring the state of our lakes and rivers for a number of years, especially those in Western Canada. These lakes and rivers are mostly fed by the runoff from mountain glaciers. Because of global warming, glaciers around the world are receding at an alarming rate, those in Canada being no exception. 

This is how things used to work: Winter set in, the snow built up and then in the spring it began to melt and run off on soil that was still frozen. Today, however, the warming of the earth means the runoff is occurring earlier but, more alarmingly, is occurring atop soil that is no longer frozen. Consequently, the glacial melt is being absorbed by the earth instead of flowing into, and replenishing, our lakes and rivers. 

"It's the crisis no one is talking about," Prof. Byers says. 

"They'll soon be," Prof. Byrne says, "because it is going to have a dramatic effect on our lives, soon." 

It's true. In fact, the crisis stage has already been reached in several parts of the world. Books and scientific journals talking about this issue have proliferated in the past few years, and yet the dire forecasts many are making have yet to cause much of a stir in the mainstream media. 

But water is huge. Prof. Byers, for instance, has been talking about the increasing pressure that Canada will be under in the coming years to sell bulk water exports to parched areas of the United States. Everyone seems to think Canada is awash in the stuff, that we have billions of excess gallons of it that can be and our supply is only diminishing." 

Prof. Byrne recently conducted a study of the water system in British Columbia's Okanagan region. Talk about an area under stress: In the past several years, the population there has boomed. It is also home to one of the fastest-growing wine regions in the world. Vineyards consume an enormous amount of water which, in that neck of the woods at least, comes from one primary source:Lake Okanagan. 

"Fly over the region now," Prof. Byrne says. "All you see is reservoir after reservoir after reservoir." 

In a scientific paper that is now in review, he is predicting that between 2020 and 2050 there will be a 30-per-cent reduction in the snow pack that feeds Lake Okanagan. 

"It will put that region into a terrible situation," he predicts. "Consumption habits are going to have to change, not only there but everywhere. It will affect agriculture and a lot of things. The simple supply and demand curve is going in the wrong direction." 

Water conservation is coming whether we like it or not. And it should. Canadians are notoriously wasteful consumers of water. And those on the West Coast are particularly bad. Prof. Byers says studies show Vancouverites use between 400 and 500 litres of water a day. Europeans use about 150. 

"There is a big social and political debate coming about what we do with our remaining water resources," says Prof. Byers. "There are going to be some big fights about who gets access to what. We are already facing scarcity in parts of Saskatchewan and Alberta. This crisis is upon us now. We can't leave it for another 10 or 15 years after it goes beyond critical before we do something about it." 

Prof. Byers sets down his coffee and looks at me. 

"Depressed yet?" 

"Yep," I say. "Pretty much." 
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