To find a better lake

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 11/02/2015 (3966 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

To look at Lake Winnipeg right now, it’s as frozen over as Pluto.

In the lake’s south basin at least, pressure ridges and scattered ice chunks dot the lake’s surface to the horizon. On a cloudy winter day, it blurs into the sky.

The lake at this time of year is mostly forgotten except for the odd snowmobiler and fisher’s ice shack.

And for the province’s Clean Environment Commission.

The CEC has been traveling the province over the past month holding public hearings into Manitoba Hydro’s request for a final licence under the Water Power Act to continue to regulate the lake’s level between 711 feet above sea level and 715 feet asl.

Hydro has used the lake since the mid-70s as a reservoir to supply water to power its northern dams during the winter, and to keep the lake at a more steady level to avoid the flooding seen on the lake in the 20s, 50s and 60s.

What the CEC is looking at is whether regulation has been good or bad for the lake, not exactly an easy question to answer. What’s unique about this hearing is that this is the first time someone is taking a hard look at the problems on the lake, like its ugly algae blooms, shoreline erosion and future of its fishery.

The lake’s regulation has also coincided with climate change and this part of the globe finding itself in an extended wet period, resulting in several years of bad flooding, 2011 and last summer being the most recent.

At the same time we know more about what nutrients are flowing into the lake, such as phosphorus from the Red River and its contribution to potentially harmful algae growth.

Granted, there’s lots of scientists and researchers already doing work into these areas, but the CEC is the first body to attempt to pull that all together and, perhaps most important, to go out and get the opinions of ordinary folks who live and work on the lake and downstream along the Nelson River.

Over the past several years, the CEC has also conducted hearings into Hydro’s Bipole III transmission line project and the new Keeyask generating station.

Whatever the CEC eventually rules on Lake Winnipeg Regulation, it will be up to the provincial government to accept or shelve its recommendations. And as we all know, there’s a pretty good chance we could have a change in government in the spring of 2016.

CEC chairman Terry Sargeant has said at some public meetings to date that while the commission is bound to focus only on Hydro’s regulation of the lake’s level, it can make other recommendations that it believes can help the lake and province.

An example is a possible recommendation to government for an environmental assessment on the whole Nelson River basin, specifically looking at the impact of hydro-electric development on First Nation communities downstream of the Jenpeg generating station.

"I think it is something that, I can’t tell you today that we will recommend that, but I can tell you today that we will seriously look at something along that nature," Sargeant said at a community meeting at Peguis First Nation. "We have heard that from other communities as well.

"We, in our own internal discussions, have talked about something along those lines. So I think you may well see something along that line."

"It will be what we call a non-licensing recommendation, because it is not directly attached to the licence at all. But in the past, or in the recent past the government has given serious consideration to a number of our non-licensing recommendations as well. I think that would be an extremely useful piece for future development in this province. Not only future development, but for looking at and hopefully finding ways to fix up a lot of the problems that we have with a lot of waterways in this province. I think it is an excellent recommendation."

Sargeant has also said that by law, Hydro is required to come back to government by 2026 to have the licence to regulate Lake Winnipeg renewed. Under the act, it is only good for 50 years – Hydro got an interim licence in 1976.

Which means that whatever recommendations government accepts, the CEC will be back repeating this licencing review process in about a decade.

Let’s hope it finds a better lake than it’s finding now.

The CEC’s hearing in Winnipeg begins March 9 at the RBC Convention Centre.

Transcripts of public meetings to date and background research material has been posted on the commission’s website.

 

From the commission:

The Clean Environment Commission is currently developing the daily schedules for the hearings in Winnipeg on Lake Winnipeg Regulation.

An open house will be held on March 9 from 3 p.m. to 5 p.m. and 7 p.m. to 9 p.m. in the Pan-Am Room at the RBC Convention Centre.

Hydro staff will be on hand to discuss Lake Winnipeg Regulation, its history, operation and impacts and answer questions. The public are encouraged to attend to gain a better understanding of the project in an informal setting.

Should anyone wish to sign up to make a presentation at the formal hearing, commission staff will be on hand to assist them and answer questions about the hearing process.

The formal hearing will begin at 9:30 a.m. on March 10, also in the Pan Am Room. Evening sessions on March 11 and March 18 have been reserved for public presentations. Anyone wishing to make a presentation should contact the commission.

The hearing will take place at the RBC Convention Centre on the first and third weeks, all other days will be at the Fort Garry Hotel, Spa and Conference Centre.

The hearing has been extended seven days, into April, from its original schedule.

The hearing will now run for approximately five weeks instead of three.

The current schedule is available at www.cecmanitoba.ca.

Daily schedules will be posted as they become available and are subject to change.