BCBusiness

16 BCBusiness april 2015 iMagE: istoCk the surface. "We currently don't know how much groundwater is being used," says Allen. "If you have a piece of the puzzle where you have no idea how much of that resource is currently being used, it's really difficult to actu- ally manage the water supply." With that in mind, the provincial government passed ambitious legislation last year that will begin to track actual water use and help address three key challenges: popula- tion growth, climate change and the expansion of B.C.'s natural resource industries. Details are being finalized this year, with the Water Sustainability Act to be phased in beginning in 2016. The new regulations will flow into every industrial nook and domestic cranny, from tap water to the family farm. Yet it is industry that will see the most significant change, with new rules on groundwater usage, mandatory reporting of usage and likely increased water costs—and this even though industry is not, as far as govern- ment knows, the largest user. Limited as they are, provincial statistics show 98 per cent of the surface water allocations are for hydro power generation— though hydro doesn't consume water but rather returns it to the system. Of the water allocated for so-called consumptive uses, most is for conservation and land improvement; mining and petroleum account for just 0.9 per cent, according to the Minis- try of Environment. While the Business Council of B.C. supports the legislative overhaul, they are concerned about the focus on large-scale industrial users. "In B.C., the natural resource sector attracts a disproportionate amount of attention in water use discus- sions, even though the cumula- tive sum of many small users may have as large or a larger impact on water quantity and quality than all of the industrial users," it said in a 2014 submis- sion to the province. One sector that will feel the impact of the new rules is B.C.'s nascent oil and gas industry, whose (potentially) exponential expansion is due to hydraulic fracturing: the high-pressure injection of water, sand and chemicals into wells to fracture the rock and release trapped gas. Every jurisdiction has dealt with the quandary of gas industry water use in different ways. Quebec, Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, Newfoundland and Labrador and dozens of U.S. cities and states have various moratoria on hydraulic frack- ing, citing among their concerns the high volume of water used, the wastewater that results and the potential contamination of nearby water sources. B.C., in its new legislation, promises a different approach. "We're looking to encour- age—and industry is doing this now—the use of deep saline groundwater," says Lynn Kriwoken, director of water protection and sustainability with B.C.'s Ministry of Environ- ment. "We're currently working with the oil and gas commis- sion and industry on what the management of groundwater looks like." As an incentive for gas producers to forgo freshwater, the province is pondering an exemption for non-potable saline water from deep below the surface. Not only is that water not drinkable, the saline water table is not connected to ground or surface water, both in heavy demand. Denise Mullen, director of environment and sustainability for the Business Council, wants a plan that exempts saline water from regulations. The council doesn't want large cost increases and would like all users to report water use: "If you exempt peo- ple from reporting—say, mostly domestic users—you don't have a complete picture." • T he year is 2077. The set- ting, Vancouver. No, really. Continuum, a futuristic science fiction show in which corporations run the continent, actually takes place here. While B.C. has a long history of hosting major sci-fi shows—The X-Files, The Outer Limits and Battlestar Galactica, to name only a few—it almost never plays itself. "We set Continuum deliberately in Vancouver because we live here," explains the show's executive producer, Tom Rowe, "and nobody decided to knock us off that perch." Soon there could be several more Canadian-made shows (as opposed to shows simply shot in Canada) joining Continuum on that perch. Simply put: The economics of making unasham- edly Canadian content, and exporting it to the world, are finally making sense. There's the longstanding infrastructure in Vancouver: 25,000 people employed in the local billion- dollar industry, not to mention Vancouver's acclaimed visual effects studios (which helped create the colossal neon skyline of Continuum's Vancouver, imagined as it might look 60 years on). There's the Canadian dollar, which with each passing day makes exporting Canadian- produced shows more attractive to U.S. buyers. And there's the proximity to L.A., where most of those buyers are. North Vancouver-based Reunion Pictures, the produc- tion company behind Contin- uum, has managed to attract a lot of buyers for its show, including HOW WE COMPARE Canada is No. 3 on the list of countries with the largest freshwater supply, behind russia and Brazil Canadian rivers dis- charge 7% of the world's renewable water supply: 105,000 cubic metres per second the average British Colum- bian uses 490 litres of water per day per person, compared to the Canadian average of 274 litres per day per person, according to environment Canada The Future Is Now Continuum, a sci-fi hit shot in Vancouver, could be a harbinger of good things to come by Trevor Melanson C u l t u r e Fraser River

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