A team of international researchers reported that some of the world’s most important freshwater sources — from the Caspian Sea between Europe and Asia to South America’s Lake Titicaca — lost water at a cumulative rate of around 22 gigatonnes per year for nearly three decades. That’s about 17 times the volume of Lake Mead, the United States’ largest reservoir.

Fangfang Yao, a surface hydrologist at the University of Virginia who led the study published in the journal Science, said 56 per cent of the decline in natural lakes was driven by climate warming and human consumption, with warming “the larger share of that.”

Climate scientists generally think that the world’s arid areas will become drier under climate change, and wet areas will get wetter, but the study found significant water loss even in humid regions. “This should not be overlooked,” Yao said.

Scientists assessed almost 2,000 large lakes using satellite measurements combined with climate and hydrological models.

They found that unsustainable human use, changes in rainfall and runoff, sedimentation, and rising temperatures have driven lake levels down globally, with 53 per cent of lakes showing a decline from 1992 to 2020.

Nearly two billion people who live in a drying lake basin are directly affected and many regions have faced shortages in recent years.

Scientists and campaigners have long said it is necessary to prevent global warming beyond 1.5 C to avoid the most catastrophic consequences of climate change. The world is currently warming at a rate of around 1.1 C.

Thursday’s study found unsustainable human use dried up lakes, such as the Aral Sea in Central Asia and the Dead Sea in the Middle East, while lakes in Afghanistan, Egypt and Mongolia were hit by rising temperatures, which can increase water loss to the atmosphere.

Lakes in Canada’s Arctic were part of the drying trend, the study found, “partially because of changes in temperature and PET (potential evapotranspiration), which is in line with broader climate changes toward increasing evaporative loss due to higher lake temperatures and reduced lake ice extents.”

Water levels rose in a quarter of the lakes, often as a result of dam construction in remote areas such as the Inner Tibetan Plateau.

Declines seen in naturally occurring lakes were in part offset, the study found, by “precipitation- and runoff-driven LWS (lake water storage) gains” in others such as the Great Lakes and Lake Winnipeg.

In all, the study said, between 1984 and 2015, satellites have observed a loss of 90,000 square km of permanent water area — an area equivalent to the surface of Lake Superior — whereas 184,000 square km of new water bodies, mainly reservoirs, were formed elsewhere.

Trends and drivers of global lake water storage have remained “poorly known,” the study added, which “impedes sustainable management of surface water resources, both now and in the future.””

— Gloria Dickie is a Reuters climate and environment correspondent in London. Includes files from Glacier FarmMedia Network staff.

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Provincial Finance Minister Cameron Friesen on Thursday introduced Bill 24 for first reading. Among its 15 proposed amendments to various pieces of legislation, the bill would repeal two sections of the Environment Act dealing with hog operations and winter manure spreading.

The previous NDP government introduced the freeze on new hog barn construction and expansions in certain areas of the province starting in 2006, expanding provincewide in 2011, with the stated aim of reducing phosphorus loading in Lake Winnipeg.

The province’s ban on winter spreading of manure from Nov. 10 to April 10 each year was imposed in 2013, also with the stated aim of reducing phosphorus runoff into waterways.

The province has said it imposed the winter spreading ban because applying nutrients onto frozen or snow-covered soils “results in an increased risk of nutrient runoff” which in waterways “contributes directly to algal blooms in Lake Winnipeg and elsewhere.”

In its press release Thursday, the province said Bill 24 would “remove general prohibitions from the Environment Act for the expansion of hog barns and manure storage facilities.”

Those prohibitions, in section 40.1 of the Act, require a provincial permit before a hog barn or hog manure storage can be built. It also prevents a hog operation from increasing its animal unit capacity.

Permits for new barns or storage would be granted only if the manure would be treated via anaerobic digestion or “another environmentally sound treatment that is similar to or better than anaerobic digestion.”

The province and Manitoba hog producers agreed in 2015 on a pilot project that would allow new barns to be built to certain environmental requirements, such as two-cell manure lagoons and limits on soil phosphorus.

Mike Teillet, manager of sustainable development at Manitoba Pork, said Monday the province’s proposed bill will “eliminate the need for impractical and extremely costly anaerobic digesters to build a pig barn in Manitoba.”

That provision, he said, “essentially stopped barn construction in the province and that is why it was often referred to as a ‘ban’ or ‘moratorium.'”

The digesters also “would have done nothing to protect the environment,” he said — and cutting that requirement is thus “a sound and practical action by the Manitoba government.”

Bill 24, as introduced Thursday, also orders a repeal for section 40.2 of the Act, which covers the winter manure spreading ban. In an “explanatory note” attached to Bill 24, the government describes the prohibition on winter manure spreading as “eliminated.”

However, Manitoba Pork’s Teillet said Monday, the ban’s inclusion in Bill 24 serves only to remove a “redundant” section of the Act that remains part of the province’s Livestock Manure and Mortalities Management Regulation, thus keeping the winter manure spreading ban in effect.

Manitoba Pork, he noted, “has never asked the government to remove the winter spreading ban” and the province’s hog producers remain “committed to environmentally-sound production practices.”

In introducing Bill 24, Friesen said Thursday the status quo “has created unnecessary challenges for both industry and government.”

The bill’s assorted proposals, he said, “were identified as priority actions by both industry leaders and the civil service” and will “reduce the red tape that is creating burdens on business, non-profits, municipalities, private citizens and government officials.” — AGCanada.com Network

UPDATE, March 20, 2017: A previous version of this article stated Bill 24 proposed to eliminate Manitoba’s ban on winter manure spreading. The article has been updated to include additional information from Manitoba Pork.

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The first dam I remember seeing is when I was about five. Dad was bouncing me on his knee and telling me stories about building the dam down on Section 11 to provide water for cows in pasture. It was dug with a Model L Case tractor and a Tumblebug (a small scraper also known as a Fresno. Watch a YouTube video about these machines here. The spillway was rip rapped with stones picked with a team of horses and stone boat. The stones were the reason it was pasture in the first place. That dam is still in place, although it has been upgraded.

A few years ago, Inga and I had lunch by the dam on SW11. It’s a pretty place and the redwing blackbirds are still a delight. They are happy with a few skinny willows. A good neighbour, Charlie Rouse now owns the land, so the land is farmed and the stones are picked.

Dams like this have served farms and ranches on the Prairies for decades. Beavers sometimes do the job for us but more often than not their dams are not where they are wanted. We have had some of that in the Allan Hills the past wet years, and steps have been taken to deal with the problem.

Large scale dams

But what about the big dams of the world? The granddaddy of them all seems to be the famous Three Gorges Dam in China that harnesses the mighty Yangtze River. A Google search spits out several very informative videos with all aspects — good and bad — discussed at length. There are many downsides, including the required relocation of a population equal to all of Saskatchewan. On the plus side, mountains of coal will not be burned to provide power with the dam in place.

Our very own Gardiner Dam at Diefenbaker Lake in Saskatchewan is big enough to be noticed on the world stage. It is there because John Diefenbaker was Prime Minister of Canada. (That’s not a political statement — just a statement of fact.)

The benefits of this dam have been many but the main benefit, hardly ever discussed, is flood protection. With the recent wet years, how many times would downtown Saskatoon have been flooded if the Gardiner Dam was not in place?

The Saskatchewan River also has dams at Codette (Nipawin) and Tobin Lake. These dams are mainly for power, but Tobin Lake is world renowned for the sport fishery.

The Nelson River between Lake Winnipeg and Hudson Bay has several hydro dams and more are possible. Some say the “constipation” effect of those dams is partly to blame for algae in Lake Winnipeg but I have no basis for an opinion on that argument.

While dealing with Saskatchewan, the Rafferty/Alameda dams on the Souris River in southeast Sask­atchewan come to mind. Alameda was just for contingency in case extra water was needed to maintain the required 50 per cent flow of the Souris to continue to the U.S. Those dams are there because Grant Devine was Premier of Saskatchewan at the time. (Again, not a political statement.)

To be honest I was very skeptical about that project. We were in the midst of soil salinity studies in the dry 1980s and the Souris was not much of a river. Parts of it were just saline grassland. It was my idea that it might never fill in our lifetime and a bit of extra water would just “goose up” the salinity. I envisaged salt plains.

That shows how wrong we can be when we look at things through our very limited time frame. Very few years later the reservoir was full and providing cooling water for the nearby coal-powered hydro station. Again, the big benefit is flood control. Minot had severe flooding in 2014, but imagine what would have happened had the Rafferty not been in place.

All big dams have risks; Google quickly spills out historical videos of disastrous failures. Most big dams have low risk and serve long useful lives. Sedimentation is the long-term result and eventually becomes a problem.

Local dams

As far as I know, there is no ongoing work to monitor the sedimentation at our Diefenbaker Lake. I often see the South Sask­atchewan River roaring mightily at Lemsford Ferry, just inside the Alberta/Saskatchewan border — we own land near there. In June, the river at Lemsford carries a huge silt load that must dump somewhere between there and the Saskatchewan Landing Bridge on No. 4 Highway. The dam has been in place for 50 years so it should be time to find out about the sedimentation.

So, while dams do alter the environment and do have some negative effects, on balance dams have served society well. I crossed the central causeway on Blackstrap Reservoir six times this week going to and from my Dundurn Farm. A beautiful site. The reservoir is there only because of Lake Diefenbaker, the Saskatoon Southeast Water Supply System canal that delivers the water, and dams at either end that keep the water at a controlled level. It is a pleasure to cross each time and be aware that we have some water in what can often be a dry land.

In today’s world, dams are often criticized, and only the negatives are talked about. There is little appetite for more dams. For sure, some rivers such as our Churchill system should be “hands off” but we should maintain an open mind.

The Assiniboine River has been a flooding problem in recent wet years. What about a second dam south of Lake of the Prairies/Shellmouth dam? I expect it has been studied but I have not seen any reports. I am sure readers will enlighten me.

So, there you have it. Let us not put the blinkers on and reject any possible new dams out of hand. On balance dams have served society well.

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In the speech, which Lt.-Gov. Janice Filmon delivered Monday, Premier Greg Selinger pledges to “work with all partners to reduce nutrient loading” in Lake Winnipeg and work to prevent further spread of zebra mussels.

The province, in a related press release the same day, said the work to reduce nutrient loading would include “restor(ing) the health of Lake Winnipeg by requiring the reduction of nutrient loading in new legislation.”

That legislation is to be introduced this fall, and is expected to step up protection for Lake Winnipeg and other water bodies, but the province didn’t provide details, such as whether the new legislation would directly affect crop and/or livestock operations.

Previous legislation in Manitoba has put limits on farmers’ ability to fertilize fields — the province’s latest annual winter fertilizing ban came into effect Nov. 19 — and on hog operations’ ability to expand, and expanded buffer zones to protect waterways from fertilizer applications.

Among other throne speech pledges affecting the farming and agrifood sectors, the province said it will invest in the “social determinants of health,” such as access to healthier foods.

To that end, Filmon said, the province “will continue to invest in community-based strategies to expand local production of healthy foods across the North, and work with producers and the agricultural sector to bring local foods to new markets.”

The province also said it will launch a new Growing Communities Infrastructure Fund, which Filmon said is meant “to help rural and northern communities build and renew roads, sewer, water and community centres that families use every day.”

One pledge to Winnipeg residents affecting Manitoba’s rail service and certain agribusinesses in the city limits, calls for the province to “initiat(e) a plan to move rail lines out of Winnipeg, to provide new options to address aging infrastructure, help families save time on their daily commute and reimagine urban renewal in Manitoba’s capital city.”

Such a plan, however, is likely to take more time than the Selinger government has, ahead of the next provincial election scheduled for April 19, 2016.

Pulling up rails in the city core would also affect rail access for agribusinesses such as ADM Milling on Higgins Avenue, which uses Canadian Pacific Railway (CP) track through the Point Douglas area, and fertilizer firm Border Chemical, which connects to CP track at its Gunn Road location in north Transcona.

CP assistant vice-president Martin Cej said Nov. 17 that the province hasn’t been in touch with the company since the throne speech, but said CP is “committed to working with the communities we operate in and we look forward to assisting in the proposed study.”

That said, he added, CP “is satisfied with the current location and operation of our rail yard in Winnipeg. It is a major yard for our operation, a major employer in the area, and plays a strategic and critical role within the region.” — AGCanada.com Network

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Water quality

There are many aspects to water quality. For irrigation use, salt content is the most important, for household washing hardness is a big deal. For drinking water, total minerals, especially sulphate, is an issue. Low nitrate is important, especially for babies.

The most important aspect of water quality for human consumption has nothing to do with chemistry — it’s the biology. The disaster of E. coli contamination of groundwater at Walkerton, Ontario and the parasites in North Battleford, Sask., water sharpened the focus on water. In the decade plus since those outbreaks, all water utilities and regulators have upped the game substantially to prevent future events of those types.

But the water quality issue we will deal with here is the issue with algal blooms on surface waters, particularly recreational lakes. It is now known that phosphorus is the main nutrient that is limiting in lakes. When the phosphorus level increases the algae have a picnic.

Back to the 70s: The Qu’Appelle River

When environmental concerns became a concern, the Qu’Appelle system in Saskatchewan was the subject of a major study. There were no intensive livestock operations at that time but Saskatchewan Agriculture did an inventory of all cows in the Valley. Some thought that all cows should be taken from upstream to keep the Qu’Appelle Lakes from getting algae in the hot “swimming” months.

The major study was completed and the results rest comfortably in a report in the government documents section of the University of Saskatchewan Library. It showed that over 90 per cent of the phosphorus in the lower Qu’Appelle system came from the cities of Regina and Moose Jaw. Shortly after that Moose Jaw converted to a sewage effluent irrigation system.

• Part 1 of Les Henry’s three-part series: Excess water and farm drainage

The big picture: Lake Winnipeg

In the past decade the large and ugly algal blooms on Lake Winnipeg have been a topic of much discussion. Folks that rely on Lake Winnipeg for resources or very important summer activities are justifiably upset. It took me a long time to realize that very low levels of phosphorus are all it takes to create a problem. So we must all be vigilant and do our part.

But let us first look at where that phosphorous comes from. Figure 1 (at the top of this article) shows a widely used, but misleading map of the Lake Winnipeg Watershed.

A December 2006 report to the Manitoba Minister of Water Stewardship entitled “Reducing Nutrient Loading to Lake Winnipeg and its Watershed” makes the following statement on page 13: “Within the Lake Winnipeg drainage basin, there are nearly 55 million hectares (jlh: 136 m acres) of farmland in the three Prairie provinces, of which more than half is under crop production and the vast majority is part of the Lake Winnipeg watershed.”

That statement is a very large misrepresentation of the actual situation.

Figure 2 shows non-contributing areas. All areas in red in Figure 2 (see below) do not contribute to external drainage, based on median annual runoff. In flat lands the area would be increased in high runoff years but even then very large areas have nothing to do with Lake Winnipeg. Large parts of “pothole country” have no connection to any external drainage.

The phosphorus load in Lake Winnipeg is sourced as follows:

• 47 per cent — Man.
• 33 per cent — the U.S.
• 12 per cent — Ont.
• 8 per cent — Sask./Alta.
• Very little would be from Alberta.

This data comes from a presentation made by Mark Lee, Manitoba Water Stewardship, to the newly-minted Assiniboine River Basin Initiative.

Phosphorus loading is well documented and any sources should be made as small as possible. But the work must be concentrated where the problem originates. For example, some recent research on the Pipestone Creek area of Saskatchewan has shown significant phosphorus losses from the field edge of bale grazing systems.

But, no one got on a horse or quad in spring to follow the water to see if any of it even reached the Pipestone Creek, let alone Lake Winnipeg. The first water body of concern on the Pipestone Creek should be Moosomin Lake. Lake Winnipeg is a long distance and many reservoir areas removed from the Pipestone.

Research on farm management practices to reduce phosphorus loss anywhere in the Canadian Prairies is simply too broad a brush and a waste of precious research funds.

Lake Winnipeg: The constipation theory

The Nelson River is located at the northeast corner of Lake Winnipeg and drains the lake to Hudson Bay. But, Manitoba Hydro has several hydro dams along that drainage route. Some folks claim that the flow restriction from the dams affects the residence time of water in the lake. That results in nutrient retention that “juices up” the algae. I have no basis or facts on which to base any opinion on that theory.

Lake Diefenbaker

In Saskatchewan we have three major dams on the Saskatchewan River system but Lake Diefenbaker is the most significant.

It is no surprise that Lake Diefenbaker is a stated priority for the University of Saskatchewan Global Institute of Water Security and the School of Environment and Sustainability. You can imagine my disappointment when I attended a grad student presentation dealing with phosphorous in Lake Diefenbaker. The project was trying to relate phosphorus levels in the Lake to fertilizer use statistics for the surrounding Saskatchewan crop districts.

The South Saskatchewan River in Saskatchewan is not even a river — it is a canal. (Credit for this goes to Kevin Shook, who used the canal label in a talk recently).

Very little of the water in the South Saskatchewan River or Lake Diefenbaker is added in Saskatchewan — 98 per cent of the flow originates from Alberta via the Oldman, Bow and Red Deer Rivers. They all join to become the South Saskatchewan just before entering Saskatchewan.

After the disappointing seminar, a few mouse clicks provided the answers I was looking for.

In 1998: 87.5 per cent of phosphorus in the Oldman River came from the City of Lethbridge. In 2000, after tertiary treatment by Lethbridge, the phosphorus contribution to the Oldman River was reduced to 23.6 per cent.

Similar numbers can be obtained for Calgary and the Bow River. With that kind of reduction one might expect a reduction in phosphorus load to the South Sask.

In 2012 the newly minted Water Security Agency of Saskatchewan produced a report entitled “ State of Lake Diefenbaker: That report said this about nutrient loading: “Nitrogen and phosphorus have been measured since the late 1960s by the Prairie Provinces Water Board (PPWB) at their Alberta/Saskatchewan border sites on the South Saskatchewan River and the Red Deer River. The length of this record allows for assessment of long-term trends. … The PPWB recently undertook such an exercise and found slight but significant decreasing trends for total and dissolved phosphorus concentrations at both the Saskatchewan and Red Deer River sites.”

Given the Alberta data showing major reductions in phosphorus load by cities the decrease makes sense. The details of that statement should be provided.

Soils in feedlot alley in Alberta are extremely high in available phosphorus. Alberta Agriculture and Environment folks have done a lot of good work in documenting the phosphorus in soils, surface water and groundwater of that area. But, as yet I have not seen an actual phosphorus load factor for that specific area.

The Future

In dealing with water quality issues we must use a rifle approach, not a shotgun. A quality problem must be traced back to the source(s) and dealt with at those sources. Describing non-point pollution as everywhere does not cut it. Generic research on an area that is not part of the problem is of little value. Water does run down hill and it can be traced. There has been a lot of doubtful research money spent on the basis that all of Canadian Prairie agriculture is somehow magically dumping all the way to Lake Winnipeg.

In Saskatchewan, Diefenbaker Lake is a priority for us, and monitoring work must be ramped up to at least what it was in the past. And, all information has to be readily available at the click of a mouse. Research work must first assemble and analyze all historic data. There is much useful data not being used.

The Assiniboine system is also a priority because what we do in Saskatchewan impacts Manitoba. As Saskatchewan drafts new legislation to deal with drainage questions the Assiniboine system will be a major priority.

None of us know how long this wet cycle will last. By the time we become more adept at handling the excess Mother Nature may well turn off the tap.

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