Province calls for more water conservation, warns of worsening drought

Drought expected to worsen

A few days of rain over the past few weeks will help, but parts of the Southern Interior, including the Okanagan are seeing worsening drought conditions.

Parts of the region are currently at Drought Level 3 and the latest drought update from the B.C. government forecasts declining stream flows in the Okanagan, Kettle, Nicola and Slocan-Lower Columbia basins.

“I was in the Okanagan last week. We spoke to a lot of First Nations and farmers and I stopped to look at the Salmon River, which is really low right now,” said Randene Neill, the minister of water, land and resource stewardship.

She said the drought conditions are putting a lot of pressure on lakes and rivers that are depended on by communities, industries, ecosystems and wildlife and rely on a steady, healthy supply of water year-round.

Neill is urging people across the province to do more to conserve water, pointing out that in some communities residential use accounts for 70 per cent of water consumption during the summer.

"Though we cannot control drought, we do know that early action will make a big difference when it comes to water scarcity impacts or the amount of water available for ecological and human needs," Neill said. "And that's why we always begin with a voluntary approach.

"My message to all of those people (with high residential water usage) is that what you do makes a significant difference to the amount of water the whole community has, and we have to remember that we have to share our water not with other residents but farmers, agriculture, industry, all of those things."

That message is nothing new to people who live in the Okanagan and other parts of the Southern Interior.

“We live with drought every day. We’re used to drought, we know that it’s coming,” said Blair Ireland, Mayor of Lake Country and chair of the Okanagan Basin Water Board.

“That’s why we’ve created the campaigns that we have, like Make Water Work and those things. With the drought level we’re in across the province, we’re in decent shape because we knew it was coming.

“At the same time, what Minister Neill said today is really, really important – being concerned about water for the future."

The province is introducing a new method for tracking drought, saying the changes are needed because the current drought index oversimplifies the conditions facing local regions.

It said the new system addressing water scarcity aligns with drought measurements in other jurisdictions and allows for a more precise understanding of climate trends across the region.

It will also measure different needs, including the drinking water supply, ecological health, fish population survival, food production and security.

David Campbell, with the B.C. River Forecast Centre said the province had only 79 per cent of its normal snowpack level by April, and the snow season ended a few weeks earlier than usual.

He said the situation this year has been made worse by a warmer spring compared to last year, when a more gradual snow melt helped to alleviate drought conditions later in the year.

Even though drought is expected to worsen in parts of the Southern Interior, the BC Wildfire Service is sounding cautiously optimistic about the fire season.

“Generally speaking, we have had great success with initial attack this fire season so far. And as the summer pushes on, it gets us closer to those shorter burning days,” said Cliff Chapman, director of wildfire operations with BCWS.

Moving into August, Chapman said fewer hours of daylight will help prevent fuel drying and holdover heat at night.

The province said it will continue to monitor stream and water conditions and temporary protection orders may be issued as a last resort if voluntary efforts aren’t enough to restore water flows to protect vulnerable species and watersheds from lasting harm.

— with files from The Canadian Press