Lake Diefenbaker plan a priority for province
A reliable water source in south is key, say Peter Leavitt and Kerri Finlay.
With last week’s announcement of a $4-billion water project, Saskatchewan stands on the cusp of a great social, political and environmental opportunity.
The plan to move water out of Lake Diefenbaker builds on a federal-provincial collaboration stretching back to the 1930s when a mega drought threatened the very existence of the province.
As a result of the Dirty Thirties’ dust bowl, the Prairie Farm Rehabilitation Administration (PFRA) was created. One of its signature projects was the construction of Lake Diefenbaker reservoir in the late 1960s to provide a reliable source of water to southern Saskatchewan in the face of extreme climate events — both droughts and floods.
Lake Diefenbaker is now the resource hub of the area, assuring a year-round water supply to Buffalo Pound Lake, the Qu’appelle River, Regina and Moose
Jaw, Mosaic and K+S potash mines, electric power generation and crop irrigation.
Prioritization of water use will be essential to the future of Saskatchewan. For thousands of years, we have lacked sufficient water to grow trees on grassland — instead, Indigenous peoples have migrated with resources, including water, rather than sitting in urban centres.
Recognition of the importance of a dry climate is essential for sustainable development in Saskatchewan. During the late 1930s, roughly 20 per cent of the rural population moved first to towns and cities, then eventually out of the province. Even with irrigation, there is every expectation that people will do the same when the next large drought hits. The Diefenbaker project has the potential to provide water to southern Saskatchewan cities and buffer the worst effects of droughts.
Saskatchewan must move away from fossil fuels toward renewable energy, either due to popular resolution, market forces or legislative regulation. Because water is essential to both hydroelectric and nuclear power generation, the project must explicitly consider these options.
Saskatchewan is home to one-half of the world’s known reserves of potash — a fertilizer critical to improving crop production and feeding an extra three billion more people by 2050.
However, most of this reserve is more than a kilometre below ground in unstable geological structures that prevent conventional mining. Instead, solution potash mines each require more than 20 million cubic meters of water each year. There is too little flow in the Qu’appelle River to sustain such use, and the alternate source of water — groundwater aquifers — only replenish themselves on the scale of centuries. Only water from Lake Diefenbaker can sustain future potash development in the south.
Farming innovation will be needed to justify the immense price tag of the Lake Diefenbaker project. Merely irrigating to grow crops already produced in both Manitoba and Alberta may not provide the highest benefit to the province. Our producers are centrally isolated, with large distance to markets that reduce the competitive advantage provided by our rich soils and sunny climate.
Incorporation of First Nations as full project partners is needed to achieve societal goals of Truth and Reconciliation. Innovative bands such as Cowessess and Pasqua stand ready to develop green energy needed to supply the pumping stations that move Diefenbaker’s water.
Finally, water used in irrigation, cities, and industries has a long history of degrading surface waters in Saskatchewan. While Diefenbaker currently boasts some of the best water quality in the area, more than 25 years of monitoring by University of Regina scientists shows that its quality is slowly degrading due to climate change and land use activities.
Saskatchewan universities have the expertise on the critical issues and opportunities that will be key to ensuring the project is a success. Peter Leavitt is a Canada Research Chair in Environmental Change and professor in biology at the University of Regina. Kerri Finlay is an associate professor in biology at the U of R.