Water capacity

[nms]

Long-term plan to address water capacity issues needed as Waterloo region grows (CBC)

A third-party review being conducted to look at water capacity in Waterloo region after concerns were raised about the impacts of aging infrastructure and a growing population will have in the community.

The Region of Waterloo currently sources its water from a combination of 100 wells and the Grand River.

Mathieu Goetzke is the acting CEO for the region. He says there won't be an impact on residents.

"Nobody's going to stop having water at their tap ... we have enough capacity to supply all of the existing demands," he said, emphasizing that the quality of the water will not be affected.

"The issue that we're seeing is a bit of an imbalance between the historical growth of the region and where the water is in the region to be able to bring it to the residents."

The water capacity issue has been identified in the Mannheim Service Area, which is made up of the most populated areas of Kitchener and Waterloo. It also includes a small portion of Cambridge, Breslau and Elmira.

The region says there is currently a third party taking a look at the service area to get a better idea of the extent of the issue.

Meanwhile, the region says it has expedited timelines to put in new infrastructure and repair aging facilities.

Goetzke says the region has managed to avoid having a water capacity issue until now by conserving water usage efficiently. Today, he says Waterloo region uses the least amount of water per person compared to other municipalities in Southern Ontario.

"People have been doing a lot of efforts for water conservation, but these efforts are plateauing," he explained.

"It's harder to improve your water efficiency because now a lot of the households and everything that's new that's being built has efficient flushes and efficient shower heads. So that effort is done. We can't do better."

'Water is our most valuable asset'
Cambridge Mayor Jan Liggett said "it is of utmost importance that a third-party review is being undertaken" to determine water capacity since the region mostly relies on groundwater.

"Water is our most valuable asset, and we need to ensure at both the upper tier and lower tier level that we are watchful and do our due diligence that the infrastructure our water flows through is working at 100 per cent," Ligett said in a statement.

"Having just completed our city budget and currently undergoing regional budget this is a good reminder how important it is that reserve funds are built up and are used only for that which they are in place for."

[ZEBuilder]

This is only coming up because the Region is currently updating the Water Supply Master Plan. It's always been known in the civil engineering world that we'd hit this point it's just happening sooner then previous projections and now it's becoming public, it's not like there is going to be water brown outs.

The Region already owns a few wells that aren't even turned on. It's a matter of getting a couple PTTWs from MECP and then turning them on.

The Region also has capacity through the ground water storage aquifer (ASR) they have where they'll effectively pump water in the winter and store it underground for use in the summer. It works thanks to an aquitard layer in the soil stratigraphy preventing the infiltration into the aquifer.

Existing systems at max capacity can supply 250 MLD, with ASR phase 1 and 2 it can increase the supply to 293 MLD. With a couple system efficiencies and the Waterloo North TP it increases to 320 MLD (most of these are done). Then with increases in G4 and Phase 1 Maple Grove you get 327 and with Phase 2 Maple Grove you get 344 MLD. The estimate for 2050 is around 200 MLD which shows there's capacity. 

If you're at average pumping and not max your 2050 value drops to 243 MLD with all of those projects implemented. Even then that is still enough with a 20% surplus. The Region hasn't grown 20% more than expected, yes it's percentage points higher but not 20%.

With the surplus of growth it does mean more supply is needed but that was always expected, a pipe to Lake Erie was always in the plan post 2050, it may just be brought to post 2040 now instead, or earlier given the scale of construction required.

[panamaniac]

Another round of Lake Erie vs Lake Huron in the offing? When was that the hot issue - back in the 1970s?

[KevinL]

I recall it from the late 80s, when they went with water from the Grand.

[creative]

Water taken from a Great Lake has to be returned to the same lake so it would have to be Erie.

[ZEBuilder]

I recall it from the late 80s, when they went with water from the Grand.

Yes, raw water from the Grand is pulled around Hidden Valley and then sent to the the High Lift Pumping Station (where there's significant storage), from there it's pumped through the industrial to Bleams Rd, it is then pumped all the way to the Manheim treatment plant where it is then mixed with groundwater taken from the Manheim wells and then feed into Zone 4.

[bravado]

When will we see water recovery be built into our codes in this province? In Cambridge, the local news headlines are all about commercial property owners with gigantic amounts of paved area complaining about the new wastewater recovery charges. It doesn't seem to be taken too seriously from the opinion of this random grump on the street.

[panamaniac]

I recall it from the late 80s, when they went with water from the Grand.

I remember how good Kitchener water was before they started drawing from the Grand.

[ZEBuilder]

When will we see water recovery be built into our codes in this province? In Cambridge, the local news headlines are all about commercial property owners with gigantic amounts of paved area complaining about the new wastewater recovery charges. It doesn't seem to be taken too seriously from the opinion of this random grump on the street.

You'll have to get it regulated in the OBC before you'll see anything change provincially. In the current environment the MECP has various requirements that have to be met when it comes to runoff however municipalities then have to implement these restrictions as part of site plan approvals.

In Kitchener for example everything needs to meet the SWM policy, watershed studies, and the ISW-MP. How it is implemented is up to the developers, but the only way to get SPA or subdivision approval is if you meet those requirements.

One of the ways to meet the requirements is through infiltration galleries (the giant yellow or black pieces of plastic you see on sites) these tend to be put next to SWM ponds however they are not limited to those locations, for example at Activa's 1198 Fischer Hallman site there's a gallery underneath the SWM pond, then there's two under parking areas, these will eventually be connected to the downspouts to collect all the roof runoff during rainfall events. Similarly at Activa's Harvest Park/Stauffer Woods subdivision there's SWM ponds and infiltration galleries next to them, but there's also infiltration galleries in the boulevards of every street to collect the rain water from all the new developments and a few other galleries scattered around. At The Metz, they'll have an infiltration channel buried underground, it serves the same purpose as a gallery but it's made of clear stone or equivalent and in this case it will run along the center of the road. You'll also see roof retention used to meet requirements for condos and apartments.

One thing to note about the Cambridge charges is they're just on utility bills now, before they were buried in property taxes so people were paying them just in a different spot, and if users were to implement LID measures or on site retention such as infiltration galleries/ponds, they can get rebates on the charge, so if a place like The Cambridge Centre decided to put infiltration galleries in the parking lot, use permeable pavements instead of the current rigid/flexible pavements they'd get reimbursed for some of the fee since some storm water will remain on site and not reach the public system.

[bravado]

This is also pretty deep in the weeds, but is there any jurisdiction that uses water efficiency as a metric for ranking projects?

I'd love a future where the zoning system and building codes actually gave incentives towards forms that pay more tax, use less water, and require less overall infrastructure spend - but it seems illegal for any city council in Ontario to judge or rank building + subdivision proposals based on any of those beneficial attributes. They just have to approve what the Province tells them to and accept the permanent liability for it.

[nms]

Waterloo Region’s water supply crisis, explained (Luisa D'Amato, The Record)

Luisa D'Amato provided a pretty good summary of the Region's water crisis after attending a briefing at the Region.  The short version is that, among other things, while the Region counted suburban growth towards the overall total of water users, they neglected to count infill development towards the total number of users.  Given the massive amount of infill development over the past two decades, that now means that the Region is at capacity of water use for Kitchener, Waterloo and points north and the Region will not approve any future developments until the water supply issue is solved.

The Region has a full web page here about the matter.  Regional staff are assessing the situation and will present more details in the future.  The goal is for a sustainable water supply system:

A sustainable water supply system requires producing enough water to meet current demand and future growth, and having a capacity buffer for periodic repairs, maintenance and emergencies. 

While this water constraint exists, the Region is unable to support approval of development applications or enter into any new agreements that add additional demand on the Mannheim Service Area water system. 

Two questions:
1. Would the Cities and/or Region be able to rescind approvals for developments that were granted in the past two decades but that have not progressed forward?  These approved developments would be using up potential capacity without the prospect of actually being built.  Or at the very least, could they be asked to reapply for a rubber stamp approval once they are clearly ready to proeceed with contruction?

2. What happens if the Cities and/or Region reject a newly proposed development because of the water capacity issue?  Can a proponent appeal to the OLT?  Can the OLT force the Region to increase water capacity?

[ZEBuilder]

The issue is way more nuanced then the public is being led onto but much of that comes down to the technical details.

The most important thing to note is that the only reason it has become an issue is the Region changed the methodology they were using to determine capacity. The previous methodology was looking at the IUS (Integrated Urban System) as a whole, using maximum system capacity (MECP recommendation), and tracking sustainable capacity but not using it in calculations. The new methodology divides the IUS into two Service Areas; Mannheim and Middleton, uses sustainable capacity and max capacity, and a 20% resiliency.

The IUS already operates under the two different service areas, Mannheim feeds KW, Breslau, Elmira, St Jacobs, a few small towns, and most of the East Side Lands of Cambridge. Middleton feeds the rest of Cambridge. The two areas are interconnected however the interconnects only exist for emergency situations, this is primarily related to the hydraulic grade lines of the different pressure zones, for example the highest HGL of the CAM pressure zones is equivalent to those of KIT 4A, KIT 2W, KIT 2E, Breslau and Bridgeport, which are very small portions of the Mannheim area (East of the Grand River and Doon) so to transfer to the largest portions of the Mannheim area (KIT 4 and WAT 4) you would need significant pumping infrastructure. The next problem with the two sections is they utilize different secondary treatment methods, Middleton uses Chlorine, Mannheim uses Chloramines, generally speaking you don't want to mix those two as it can create quality issues and taste issues. Hence you can't easily transfer water in the current environment from Middleton to Mannheim.

Another thing to note is Waterloo Region has done a surprisingly good job at water conservation to the point that the peaking factor is the lowest of most municipalities in Ontario (ratio of max demand to avg demand), which means we can't easily conserve more water. Waterloo Region also uses weekly data for peaking factor calculations but it still relays the same information. For some context MECP recommends 1.5, which most municipalities target in there plans and generally report around that value or above but it does fluctuate. The only similar municipality that is below 1.5 is Guelph at 1.34 compared to Waterloo Region at 1.24 (they're also the two largest areas that predominantly rely on groundwater).

Now since they changed to looking at sustainable capacity it meant that the amount of water the system has to use has been decreased, in Mannheim there is 114,000 cubic meters of demand at present, supply is at 126,000 cubic meters, so there is capacity left in the system, however when including the 20% resiliency the capacity of the system falls to 101,000 cubic meters, which is below our existing demand hence the capacity problem. When including the additional approvals into the system it makes the problem worse.

To put this in different terms in the Mannheim treatment area the capacity is 1455 L/s when operating at 100%, with 20% resiliency it drops to 1164 L/s, and currently the system is operating at 1356 L/s. The additionally approved applications are 236 L/s which we don't have capacity for with the new method. Hence if a major system were to go offline (ERB WTP, Strange WTP, 1/2 Mannheim) we would be in a very rough situation, similarly if the Grand River gets contaminated upstream of Hwy 8, or something in the surface pumping system fails Mannheim goes offline which again isn't a good situation (Calgary type situation). Now with the old method we would be relatively okay for a bit but you don't want to consistently draw down more from the aquifer than can be replaced as that just creates a larger problem down the road.

Now to ease some of the chaos there is additional capacity in the Mannheim IUS that has been identified that just isn't operational, the only new system brought online in the last 10 years is the Laurel wells. There are still the Woolner Wells, Lancaster Wells, Forwell Wells, and Pompei Wells which exist but just aren't pumping anything, those can be brought online with some work but it would provide that capacity relief. They have roughly 306 L/s of capacity (this is old data and with the updated method it will be less) but it would ease some of the capacity issues including all those SPAs/Subdivisions before ultimately a pipeline is built to Lake Erie.
 
For the questions nms posed:
1. Not easily, especially without creating some major legal battles.

2. The Cities likely wouldn't blanketly reject an application it would mostly be approved with a holding provision in place until capacity is increased, now for projects that don't require zone changes it's more complicated and likely there will be conditions in place on the site plan. It would not be surprising in the slightest if the cities put a blanket holding provision in place on the entire city for the time being with the exception for those that have already gotten approvals as they're already included in the capacity calculations. Technically speaking the applicant could appeal decisions to the OLT and in theory they could force the municipality to do something, but it would likely be a losing argument for the developer as most people in the engineering realm are aware of the complex hydrogeological conditions of Waterloo Region.

Overall the problem can be solved in a few ways, but regardless there would be significant money required (substantial tax increases, larger DCs or money from the Province), Cambridge can also be part of the solution by building something but that's also a nuanced issue.

[bravado]

I have to assume that the legal framework doesn’t exist (and won’t, due to Ford being in charge) to give incentives to water-saving infill and “punish” water-wasting sprawl? It doesn’t sound like anyone is discussing how we can both grow AND change our planning priorities to make it possible. It sounds like most local commentary is focused on stopping growth and claiming mission accomplished.

[ZEBuilder]

I have to assume that the legal framework doesn’t exist (and won’t, due to Ford being in charge) to give incentives to water-saving infill and “punish” waste-wasting sprawl? It doesn’t sound like anyone is discussing how we can both grow AND change our planning priorities to make it possible. It sounds like most local commentary is focused on stopping growth and claiming mission accomplished.

The legal framework doesn't exist because it hasn't been a problem like this before, there are cases where municipalities disagree with developers on servicing but nothing to the extent of this so the politics of it are brand new, as such it's going to be a complete mess. 

The communication from the Region could also be improved by explaining the why, right now it's just we have a quantity issue and the media keeps making it seem like the Region hasn't planned for anything. In reality it's not that, the goal posts have just moved which the media seems to be missing.

The simplest way to grow would be to utilize existing resources in the most efficient manner, but basic economics makes that impossible. In this case it would mean moving some growth to the Middleton lands, grow Cambridge while KW finds more water. In this case it means Cambridge has to willingly accept growth which isn't going to happen within the current political realm that exists locally and provincially.

The Region doesn't even have a say in planning policy anymore because of the province removing their power, so the only people who can force development in Cambridge is now themselves, but as we all know Cambridge has a bad tendency of shooting themselves in the foot.

[neonjoe]

There’s been well drilling equipment on the municipal property by the Amand Drive SWP. Last year it appeared that they were doing exploratory drilling. Is this perhaps related to bringing more capacity online.
As a note is there any calculation differentiating the water capacity per suburban unit compared to apartment unit. I would think that a house would use substantially more water since the people can irrigate their lawn, well as wash their vechicles, or fill pools etc.