The most populated watershed in southern Alberta is under pressure, and we need to make the right choices about handling land use in the Bow River Basin if we are to continue to enjoy the same quality of life. These are, in part, the findings of Phase 1 of The Upper Bow Basin Cumulative Effects Study (UBBCES), a landmark GIS study detailing the physical footprint of the upper Bow Watershed.

A working group that included Brad Stelfox of the ALCES GROUP, the Alberta Wilderness Association, the Bow River Basin Council, and several other researchers, industry leaders, and environmental non-governmental organizations, hatched the idea for the UBBCES in 2007. Water Matters' board member Eric Lloyd has been a key facilitator of the study from its inception.

Using the Alberta Landscape Cumulative Effects Simulator (ALCES) developed by Stelfox and his colleagues, the UBBCES set about both "back-casting" and forecasting the physical footprint of the Bow River and its key tributaries from Bow Lake to the Carseland Weir. The back-casting entailed compiling GIS for the study area from 1905 to 2005 to reconstruct the historical data of forestry, energy, agriculture, transportation, residential development, and tourism and recreation. From these historical data, Stelfox and his colleagues calculated trends and future trajectories,  allowing them to forecast what the basin will look like under a business-as-usual scenario over the next two generations (70 years).

The findings are alarming.

"ALCES simulations suggest that continued population growth and our demand for homes and resources will degrade water quality and reduce agricultural lands and natural areas over the next two generations," says Lloyd, facilitator for the UBBCES. "If we don't change the way we manage our communities, agricultural lands, forests, and roads, this will continue to impact water quality, water supply, wildlife and fish, and working farms and ranches."

Study highlights

Below are just some of the UBBCES findings:

• In most years in the future there will be enough surface water for all users upstream of the Carseland Weir, but there is significant uncertainty around future supplies during drought years and the ability of use to adapt to climate change.
• With increasing water demand, withdrawals are projected to remove almost 20 percent of yearly flow under average conditions and up to 50 percent under low-flow conditions.
• Increased water withdrawal and reduced groundwater recharge areas have reduced the total amount of shallow groundwater by almost one-fifth over the last century.
• Surface water quality has also worsened in the Bow River and its tributaries so it is no longer safe to drink directly from these streams.
• Storm sewers continue to discharge directly into the Bow River, and water quality upstream of Calgary is rated "good" to "excellent" while water quality at the Carseland Weir downstream of Calgary has declined to "fair."

The study finds these trends will only worsen in the future and continuing with business-as-usual for the next 70 years will increase the risk of unintended or undesirable effects on these natural values and on the quality of life in the basin.

UBBCES Phase 2

Fortunately, there are choices that can push back some of the trends that emerged in the Phase 1 of the UBBCES. Phase 2 of the UBBCES will develop a simulation that projects the current landscape two generations into the future using a suite of best-practice options for each of the land-use sectors considered in Phase 1. The effects of each best practice will be evaluated for each of the performance indicators selected for the study, and these results will be compared and contrasted with the Phase 1 results. Phase 2 results will assist the UBBCES steering committee in understanding the value of best practice technologies and will reveal to what extent best practices can mitigate the risk of different development impacts on the landscape.

Will it make a difference?

The obvious way to best make use of the information coming out of the UBBCES is the Land-use Framework, which includes the South Saskatchewan Regional Plan (SSRP) and the sub-regional Calgary Metropolitan Plan (CMP). The CMP team members have frequently conversed with Lloyd and Stelfox to understand how to incorporate the UBBCES findings, and there is hope that the CMP will incorporate the results of the UBBCES study into their planning. Phase 1 of the UBBCES also has been submitted to the regional advisory council for the SSRP, but it is too early to know what kind of traction the study will have there. Ideally, the public will be able to incorporate the findings from the UBBCES into their commentary and suggestions that arise during the SSRP public consultation period in the fall, by visiting the Bow River Basin Council's website.

Sources

ALCES Group. 2010. The Upper Bow River Basin - Past, Present, Future - Upper Bow River Basin Cumulative Effects Study. Calgary, AB.  July 2010 (Accessed July 28, 2010)

Lloyd, Eric. Correspondence. August 5, 2010.

Lloyd, Eric. Upper Bow Basin Cumulative Effects Study (UBBCES) Terms of Reference. Calgary, AB. February, 2008. (Accessed July 28, 2010)