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bob sandford

BRITISH COLUMBIA’S NEW CLIMATE REALITY: “Brace for another drought crisis in 2019,” stated Kim Stephens, Executive Director of the Partnership for Water Sustainability, when he reflected on crossing an invisible threshold to a new climate regime (June 2019)

June 15, 2019


“The new reality in BC is drought and flooding. It is either famine or feast. The water balance is out of balance,” says Kim Stephens. “The summer dry season has extended on both ends. Communities can no longer count on a predictable snowpack and reliable rain to maintain a healthy water balance in watersheds. This is putting water supply systems and ecosystems under extreme stress. 2015 was the first year of this new reality. By 2018, there was little doubt that the extent of drought and forest fires in the Northern Hemisphere may define a turning point in human history.”

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BRITISH COLUMBIA’S NEW CLIMATE REALITY: “This is the fifth year of a pattern of drought that used to be something seen every 10 or 20 years,” stated David Campbell, Hydrologist & Section Head, BC River Forecast Centre (June 2019)

June 15, 2019


Extreme hot dry weather has left streams and rivers across the province running low and that’s creating drought conditions more commonly seen in late July. “I tend to be kind of shocked,” David Campbell said. “All of the rivers across the province are extremely low for this time of year. We are coming into conditions that we haven’t really seen at all — or certainly not that often.” That has elevated concerns about already vulnerable salmon that need the tributaries to get into the rivers to spawn in late summer, when the drought is expected to be at its worst.

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LONGER, DRIER SUMMERS ARE METRO VANCOUVER’S DROUGHT MANAGEMENT REALITY: The Early Edition’s About Here columnist Uytae Lee says climate change means reservoirs won’t always be full (June 2019)

June 12, 2019


“We hear all the time, Vancouver is rainy, why does a place like this need water restrictions?,” said Uytae Lee. “It’s because rainy summer days are becoming rarer and the reservoirs will be emptier and it’s no longer enough to cross our fingers and hope it lasts through fall. A key part of our water problem in Vancouver is we treat our water supply like a buffet. One solution is to install water meters on City of Vancouver homes — similar to hydro meters — that can record residential water usage. Only six per cent of homes in the city currently have a meter installed.”

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