EDITOR’S COMMENT
From tragedy to triumph
was intrigued to receive an invitation from the Government of Ontario to attend the Canadian state’s first Global Water Leadership Summit in Toronto on 17-18 May (see page 12). The event was a launch pad for Ontario to position itself as a water technology hub, akin to water-poor Singapore and Israel.
I Unlike Singapore and Israel, though, the
international Water Poverty Index shows Canada to be the second most water-rich nation on earth. Ontario itself is geographically dominated by water, bordering four of the five Great Lakes.
Water-rich it may be, but the tragedy that occurred in the town of Walkerton, in May 2000, underpins the Government’s positioning on water and more specifically, water quality. Some seven people were killed in an
E.coli incident emanating from the town’s water treatment plant, and half the 4,800 population fell ill.
It is worth revisiting the incident at a time of Environment Agency cutbacks in England and Wales. Opposition politicians in Canada had been campaigning against a 40% cut in the environment budget and the loss of 2,400 jobs. Water testing had been shifted out of government laboratories and onto the municipalities themselves five years earlier, but with no system of certification for private labs, or real legal requirements for testing and reporting.
Reports into the incident showed that the brothers who operated the plant for the Walkerton Public Utilities Commission had decades of experience, but no formal training. They drank on the job, falsified records and routinely failed to check chlorine residuals, despite the plant being at risk of contamination. The Ministry of Environment had failed to regulate water quality and ensure guidelines were being followed. The report recommended a transformation in the way Ontario managed its resources. No doubt the practical lessons of Walkerton are written into the textbooks of every water engineering course in North America, and etched onto the minds of water quality inspectors everywhere. But it has also entered the mainstream political discourse of Ontario.
The Clean Water Act, adopted in 2006, made source water protection part of a comprehensive multi-barrier approach to drinking water safety, giving the region the highest water quality in North America. The training and certification of operators was made mandatory, along with a quality management system for water suppliers and more competent
enforcement. The cathartic mission of this H2O-blessed state has gone still further though, with the Water Opportunities & Conservation Act, passed last year. This obliges Ontario not only to develop its own infrastructure, but to create new jobs and water technologies for the global market and it is backed by solid government support.
Speaking at the Summit, Premier Dalton McGuinty, reflected on the errors of the past: “Ontario is now emerging as a water technology powerhouse,” he said. “This is because setting higher standards forced us to innovate. “ Ontario’s love of water may be born out of a tragedy, but its political leadership on water and innovation is a model worth emulating. nnn
Natasha Wiseman, editor Have your say, email
natasha.wiseman@fav-house.com June 2011 Water & Wastewater Treatment 3
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