Where Does Our Water Come From?
Thinking Ahead: Lessons from Childhood
When I was a young child, every summer my mom and I would go to the Laundromat to do the wash. I thought it was an amazing amount of fun to meet new people, use the change machine, and sometimes I’d even be allowed to get a chocolate bar out of the vending machine! What could be better than that?
What I never considered is why we went to the Laundromat. The reason was, with new and increasing development of our area, despite having two wells on our property, summer often meant that there was not enough water. My parents, in an effort to ensure the taps would keep running, would find lots of ways to use less water at our house, such as installing efficient fixtures, instructing my brother and I not to flush unless necessary, and doing the laundry elsewhere.
Around the time my family moved away from the Beaverbank area of the Halifax Regional Municipality (HRM) (I was eight), residents were being hooked up to the Halifax Water system so that they could access a stable water supply.
As Halifax continues to expand and develop, the problems my family experienced during my childhood are affecting other families. More and more new communities are asking for the municipality to invest in the infrastructure required to have them on the central water system - just this Fall another suburb asked for support. It’s difficult to justify continued investment in expanding infrastructure when current infrastructure needs maintenance, and without proper planning it is likely that the infrastructure will become greater than the water table below us can support.
Staying Connected
The other issue with connecting to the central water system is we lose a connection with where our water comes from.
A few years ago I was a presenter with the Halifax Waterfront for World Oceans Day. I’d brought along a groundwater model kit - the kit simulates a ground water system, and with a little food colouring you can see how contamination moves through a groundwater system. Many people, especially young children, appreciated the model. But others would approach me and say, “Oh that doesn’t apply to me - I’m on Halifax Water.”
The idea of Halifax Regional Municipality employees just creating water through a complex electrolysis system came to mind, but I was certain that the water these people were using was actually from Pockwock Lake, which sits at the border of Hants and Halifax County. Pockwock Lake is also in close proximity to Highway 101, a major Nova Scotia Roadway. If I were watching the 6 o’clock news and saw that a transfer truck had a major accident along that stretch of highway I’d be concerned about the quality of “Halifax Water.”
I wondered if those who quickly said the groundwater system didn’t affect them understood that in the end, Halifax water is connected to the natural water table?
Challenge: Where Does Your Water Come From?
Once we moved to Wallace Nova Scotia, our new well - which doesn’t dry up - draws from the Phillip/Wallace watershed, named for its connection to both Wallace River and the River Phillip. The water tends to be a tad on the hard side, which leads me to believe that it comes from the Middlebourough Formation, home to limestone and mudstone as well as the world famous Wallace Sandstone. The current quarry is close to my parent’s home. Since high school I’ve been involved with a local watershed group called the Friends of the Pugwash Estuary, even working for them for a summer before heading away for University. My involvement with them has made me much more aware of my water and where it comes from.
My challenge to all of you is to answer these questions:
- -- Where does the water that runs from your tap come from?
- -- Are there any groups working to protect it?
In Atlantic Canada we have an overwhelming amount of local watershed groups, working to preserve our water systems for future generations. It is my belief that once we’re all more connected to the water that supplies us we’ll be more likely to want to conserve water, and more open to better planning that enables us to more easily conserve our water. We have a long way to go, but today is the best place to start.
I'd love to hear about how this challenge went for you. I encourage you to comment with the answer to these two questions - be sure to mention where you live!
