Barrie’s Water: It’s FREE now, but shouldn’t we pay for it?
by Peter Bursztyn
Canada is riddled with lakes. Many are tiny, but we also “own” or share the world’s largest lakes, plus some very impressive rivers. Altogether, Canadians control or share 20% of the world’s liquid fresh water. With a modest population, our annual water withdrawals are just 2% of resources. Why are we agitated about water exports?
Not surprisingly, overabundance has led to abuse. Disregarding irrigation, we have the world’s highest per capita water use. Also, we were careless with our wastes and have polluted many lakes and rivers near our cities. Even our groundwater shows signs of contamination. In fact, whether their water is pure or not, Canadians buy bottled water and water filters eagerly. Justified or not, many of us no longer trust our water.
That probably explains our passion about water exports. Recently, the Council of Canadians and the Canadian Environmental Law Association made good arguments for disallowing bulk water sales. I dissent from this position. Refusal to sell water will be challenged by commercial and government interests within Canada and abroad. We will be perceived as miserly, unwilling to share an abundant resource which others need. There are huge corporations out there whose business is water and who want to get their hands on ours. We cannot hope to match their government and trade connections, and their advertising muscle has yet to be felt.
The basic problem is that we do not speak the same language as corporations and governments. Our desire to preserve Ontario’s beaver or BC’s salmon habitat means little to the bosses of the world’s largest water companies (coming soon to a location near you). These are people whose language is money, who bribe eager governments with promises of jobs and tax revenues. Let’s learn their language! Up to now water “takings” have been “free”. Drill a borehole, install pumps and bottling lines, hire some trucks and voila, you could be in the water export business. Oh yes, you have to apply to the provincial government for a (seldom refused) “permit to take water”, but the water itself is costless. That should change.
Water “takings” should be paid for. We should set a price for water – whether used to irrigate a golf course or fill a swimming pool. I can just hear city folk cry “We already pay for water”. We do pay for pumping, filtering, storing and distribution, but not for the water itself. It’s time we did. In Barrie, I pay $0.40/m3, or $0.0004 per litre. Suppose we add around $0.0005 for the water itself. Nationally, this would be a huge sum, some of which could promote conservation and pollution prevention. A private individual with a borehole for domestic water should pay nothing. However, when annual “takings” are large enough to fill swimming pools or irrigate golf greens, a fee should apply. Why?
As water is drawn from an aquifer, the water table drops. This could make a neighbour’s well go dry. Here comes the point of charging: if wells go dry, the water fee should rise – steeply enough to encourage conservation and to (perhaps) halt commercial sales.
When water is taken from a lake or river on a large scale, its level may drop. The water charge should then rise. Scanty rainfall may also cause falling water levels, and should trigger a rise in the water fee. The increased revenues could compensate marinas and waterside hotels whose business suffers, or hydropower generators who must reduce output. In other words, water should be a commodity whose price is set according to the laws of supply and demand.
Since the commodity belongs to all Canadians, a public and transparent agency must set the fee region by region according to local supply. This charge should reflect the status of individual aquifers, lakes and rivers. Is such a bureaucracy worthwhile?
The alternative doesn’t bear thinking about. Eventually, enough money may become available to build a pipeline from Lake Superior to Arizona or California. Using examples of dry countries like Pakistan, Somalia and Namibia, a body like the World Trade Organization or NAFTA could rule that banning water exports should attract sanctions. The fact that none of these could afford the transport charges to buy our water is irrelevant. How can we defend ourselves?
Right now, if a company has an agreement to take water and government changes its mind, the aggrieved company challenges government’s right to do so. This has happened in Newfoundland and BC. Had government simply “adjusted” its water fee according to local supply, these cases would fail. However now, government, local people and the environment may well lose. A variable fee set according to availability should stand in court. There are many precedents: oil, wheat, cotton, copper, coffee, etc. are all traded on this principle. An Ontario government commission has been “looking into” gasoline prices. Despite the likely popularity of price controls, they have been unable to do anything. Far from being some evil plot, gasoline pricing operates according to the unwritten laws of commerce.
Once a water fee is entrenched, we can argue that this must rise in a particular locality because wells are drying or lake levels are dropping. We can expect wide support for such a move from local people and politicians. Instead of being one of society’s favoured whipping boys, environmentalists could look forward to basking in the warm glow of popularity!