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“Our work is the first to directly investigate the impact of these ‘rivers in the sky’ on ‘rivers on the land’ using climate model projections. Focusing on the Fraser River Basin, Canada’s largest Pacific watershed, and using a business-as-usual industrial emissions scenario, we show that the basin transitions from one where peak flow results from spring snowmelt to one where peak flow is often caused by extreme rainfall,” stated Charles Curry. “What the models tell us is sort of an overview or a kind of a probability of these events getting more frequent in the future. But we just can’t say so much about the exact timing of when they’re going to occur.”

“At the beginning of 2021, the Partnership leadership reflected on our long-term commitment to collaborative leadership and growing a network. From the outset, we had vowed never to fall into the trap of concentrating our energies on building an organization and thus losing sight of ‘the mission’. This view of the world reflected our history as a roundtable,” stated Kim Stephens. “Are there other precedents for our approach, we wondered? Or are we unique? We decided it was time to research the social science literature to definitively answer these and other questions.”

According to Marty Ralph, despite being relatively small compared to the rest of the atmosphere, these rivers in the sky can carry up to 95 per cent of the water vapour that travels around the Earth’s surface, and can bring anywhere between 30 and 50 per cent of a given region’s yearly water supply.The warmer the air is, the more water vapour it can carry. As the atmosphere’s average temperature rises, then, an atmospheric river can grow — and when it makes landfall, it can release more rain or snow than in years past.

“It has been one of the most severe natural disasters to strike British Columbia in a generation, even after a year that has brought crisis after crisis. The sheer scope of the damage has been difficult to comprehend. This is a timeline of the first week, from storm touchdown to early clean-up, of a disaster which has effects that will reverberate across the province for months to come,” wrote Rhianna Schmunk. “The storm broke dozens of all-time rainfall records, dumping nearly a month’s worth of rain on some communities over 48 hours.”

“While investing in emergency preparedness along with climate action, mitigation and adaptation will be costly, doing so will be much more cost effective than having critical infrastructure systems fail as a result of extreme weather events. We welcome the commitment made by the province to work with UBCM to consider the recommendations identified in the Ensuring Local Government Financial Resiliency report, and are ready to get to work on steps necessary in order to ensure B.C. communities have the resources necessary for our changing climate,” stated Laurey-Anne Roodenburg.

“Irrigation for agriculture is a dominant use of water in British Columbia, the need is seasonal, and use peaks when water supply is at its lowest. With longer and drier summers being the new reality for water management, the Agriculture Water Demand Model is a game-changer for achieving food security in British Columbia. We have downscaled climate data to a 500-metre grid across the province. This means we can reliably estimate the total water need for agricultural irrigation. This further means that the Province can align water allocation and water use. This is a powerful outcome,” stated Ted van der Gulik.

“Ted van der Gulik had a mandate that allowed him to put his ideas into practice through province-wide implementation of the Agriculture Water Demand Model (AWDM). The power of the tool is found in the provincial 500-metre gridded climate dataset, a North American first. Because it generates solid data on agricultural water need, the AWDM is the tool of choice for doing a Water Sustainability Plan. Work is required in other sectors, notably fisheries, to similarly apply a science-based approach and in so doing generate solid numbers to quantify their needs,” stated Kim Stephens.

“What we have in mind when we say ‘imagine’ is that players would imagine a legal tool or procedure that would ensure that barriers are removed or other parties in the process more effectively fulfil their piece of the sustainable development puzzle. There are solutions to be found if all parties in the community development process, i.e., staff within local and regional governments as well as private and other actors external to government but no less involved in the development process, simply talk to each other about how they could all work together more effectively, using law reform or other process changes as tools,” stated Susan Rutherford.

In September 2021, Greystone Books published The Ocean’s Whistleblower. It is the first authorized biography of Daniel Pauly, a truly remarkable man. Daniel Pauly is a living legend in the world of marine biology. And he lives in British Columbia. Among his many contributions is the Shifting Baseline Syndrome. This is a foundational concept. And it goes to the heart of the vision for intergenerational collaboration.

According to John Finnie, the Partnership for Water Sustainability challenges its audiences by posing this question: what do you want this place to look like in 50 years? The decisions communities make today will ripple through time. We do have a choice – will it be cumulative impacts or cumulative benefits? Looking back, 2008 was a defining year for ‘designing with nature’ on Canada’s west coast. The government of British Columbia put in place a policy framework that is a ‘call to action’ on the part of local governments.