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Latest news about the Safe Drinking Water Team
When wildfires threatened Lytton First Nation in 2021, Warren Brown was essential in protecting his community’s water supply by staying behind—as others evacuated to safety—to ensure the water treatment plants remained up and running. He wanted to do everything he could to ensure his community had safe and clean drinking water to come home to. Warren’s commitment to caring for his community’s clean water supply continues to play a significant role in protecting their health and safety.
Some researchers thought her team wouldn't even be able to detect an impact from the fires because the Athabasca River was already looking like tea before the fires. Heavy rains tend to send hot fudge-looking runoff from the land into the river, making it look like chocolate milk, she said. Arriving after the fires, Emelko said she could see that hot fudge-looking flow enter the Athabasca's waters as ash, likely carrying nutrients like phosphorous and carbon, made the water supply challenging for treatment processes. "Those [workers] were living in the water treatment plant, working hard to make sure that people could return to their homes and at least have safe water to drink," Emelko told Day 6 host Brent Bambury.
The proposed water-bottling plant has raised concerns from the High Bar First Nation over the aquifer's long-term sustainability, and has fuelled calls for a moratorium on groundwater bottling licences issued by the province. Greg Crookes, a natural resource manager for the High Bar First Nation, says the community has been in regular talks with the province, each time strongly opposing the plant. "If we say yes to extracting some water now, what's that going to look like 10, 20, or 100 from now?" said Crookes. He says the area only gets about 28 centimetres of precipitation per year, the same figure included in Environment Canada's precipitation records for the years 1981 to 2010. "If they need water, go to the places where the water exists — don't go to some of the driest places in B.C.," he said. "The ranchers need the water, the First Nations need the water, the animals need the water."
