New recommendations to help Kamloops protect water supply, reduce use in extreme weather

Photo: Castanet Staff

In light of last summer's extreme weather, city staff have developed new recommendations to help Kamloops reduce water use in times of drought and heat, and to protect its water supply for emergency firefighting efforts.

In a civic operations committee meeting Tuesday, Greg Wightman, the city’s utility services manager, said staff have developed some measures to be implemented this summer, and have also started a review of the city’s water master plan.

“We have identified a need for enhanced water use restrictions, certainly after what we saw last year with some of the fire events and some of the water use numbers that we've seen coming out of KCWQ [Kamloops Centre for Water Quality]. This is something that is required,” Wightman said.

Along with water restriction recommendations, staff are also proposing emergency measures that can be enacted in rare times of extreme weather — such as last June’s heat dome.

“The emergency measures are proposed to ensure we can provide critical water supply for fire suppression, as we saw the need for that up in Juniper last year,” Wightman said.

A report prepared for the committee said Kamloops’ overall water use has seen a reduction in past years thanks to the installation of water meters and city work on infrastructure.

However, staff said Kamloops consistently ranks in the top three water systems in Canada for the highest peaking factor — meaning water use in the summer is much higher than in the winter, largely due to irrigation.

Staff said the city’s water system was pushed near its limits this past summer due to record breaking high temperatures and wildfires. According to the report, the KCWQ is designed to produce 160,000 cubic metres of water per day, and maximum day water demand hit near 140,000 cubic metres.

“As a result of the extreme temperatures and fire threat, water demand reached levels that had not been seen since 2006,” the report said.

Wightman said staff have recommended encouraging voluntary reductions in water use during extended periods of warm weather or drought and will launch a public education campaign on the matter.

“We'll be monitoring the drought stages that the province is putting out, certainly monitoring the forecast as we always do, looking at things like water use trends, analyzing a whole series of data to come up with that recommendation,” Wightman said.

He said city data shows the community responded well to a call for voluntary water use reduction around the time of the Kamloops East interface fire — the lightning-caused blaze that threatened Juniper Ridge and Valleyview on Canada Day last year.

Wightman said the utilities team has worked closely with the parks department to ensure the city will also reduce its water when it calls for the community to do the same.

“We'll certainly be trying to set the example by doing that internally,” Wightman said.

He said in rare situations, the city will enact emergency measures as laid out in the waterworks bylaw, “which include a ban on all outdoor water use for short durations for all non-commercial properties.”

“A good example would be what we saw in the heat dome last year, where we need to protect that water supply for KFR and their crews, and we had a real difficult time ensuring that we could continue to provide the water that was required last year,” Wightman said.

Coun. Denis Walsh asked why the emergency water restrictions wouldn’t be applied to commercial businesses.

Wightman said staff want to ensure businesses can still operate.

“If we can have the reductions in non-commercial properties that aren't impacted in the pocketbook by turning off their sprinklers, and the worst thing that happens is the grass goes brown and we can continue that kind of business continuity piece, that's what we're going to try here and see how the community responds to that,” he said.

Wightman said city staff are also working to update the city’s water master plan. A revised document is expected to come before the committee in the coming months, with the intention of having more detailed recommendations in place for summer 2023.

Travis Pahl, utilities engineer for the city, told the committee staff are reviewing the plan while taking into account city growth and other trends. Pahl said conserving water could also help extend the life of the city's infrastructure.

“Into that [review], we weave in some asset management, as well as look at opportunities to utilize water conservation to defer some of our infrastructure needs — and in some cases, eliminate them,” Pahl said.

Wightman said the city will also continue to meet with Tk’emlups te Secwepemc and the Rayleigh Waterworks District to discuss a regional approach to water use reduction and drought management — a measure encouraged province-wide by the B.C. government in 2021.