Role
for privatization in achieving safe water
(Saskatoon
Star Phoenix, August 17, 2001)
Following
is the personal viewpoint of the writer, President and CEO of the
National Round Table on the Environment and the Economy.
It
wasn’t just another springtime Sunday morning as two semi-trailers,
parked in the North Battleford Canadian Tire parking lot, disgorged
thousands of bottles of water.
A line
of cars a kilometer long looped around a shopping mall that day
this May, waiting to get the clean drinking water. Hundreds of local
residents had already come down with gastro-intestinal ailments
from drinking municipal tap water.
It
was a scene that is becoming less uncommon all the time, as the
expensive cost of fixing aging, under-funded and under-maintained
water and sewer systems haunts many communities across Canada.
The
immediate problem that surfaced in North Battleford was the water
treatment system’s failure to stop the chlorine-resistant
microbe cryptosporidium.
Underlying
problems included the location of the sewage treatment plant’s
discharge pipe upstream from the drinking water intake.
North
Battleford is not alone. Although their water sources make the presence
of cryptosporidium unlikely, neither Vancouver or Winnipeg, two
big cities that rely on primitive water treatment systems, would
protect residents from that same contamination.
Walkerton,
Ont., where seven residents died last year and thousands were made
ill from e-coli contaminated tap water, was only the most tragic
manifestation of a nation wide problem of inadequate drinking water
treatment.
Much
of the country has relied too long on our abundant sources of fresh
water which were used and disposed of wastefully and in tremendous
volumes. It doesn’t make economic sense.
Even
as we opened the taps and left the room, we ignored the condition
of the equipment that treats and the pipes that deliver the water.
For three decades, Canadians made minimal investment in new treatment
facilities, technologies and management. Some communities are still
using systems that pre-date Confederation.
The
result is that many Canadians now face a crisis in their water and
sewage systems.
From sea to sea to sea, Canadians municipalities impose boil water
advisories each year. In St. John’s and nearly one-third of
the communities of Newfoundland, in Charlottetown and dozens of
British Columbia towns, and in more than 200 locations last year
in Quebec, that quintessentially Canadian resource – clean
water – has been found tainted or even toxic.
Elsewhere,
the stovetop pots aren’t boiling yet, but the plants and pipes
that deliver clean water and treat sewage are deteriorating while
local councils fret: Where will we find the massive investment capital
needed to upgrade our systems?
It’s
a real worry. The cost of essential repairs and expansion in this
decade are estimated by the National Round Table on the Environment
and the Economy at $38 billion to $49 billion. For many municipalities
financially battered by downloading, the cost of responding has
been intimidating, if not paralyzing.
This
financial reality was set out five years ago by the Round Table,
which even then charted the severe deterioration of infrastructure
due to under-funding since the 1970s.
The
Round Table report confirmed that Canada has the lowest consumer
prices in the world for water. Most Canadian municipalities subsidized
50 per cent of consumers’ cost of water and wastewater services.
Nearly two-thirds of Canadian homes did not have a water meter and
were simply charged a flat rate, regardless of usage. The report
predicted “the health of the country’s water resources
will suffer “ if new financial arrangements were not adopted
quickly.
That
was five years ago and the results of inaction are seen today in
the contamination incidents and the clamour of municipal and provincial
officials for federal assistance. But the answer may lie closer
to home.
It
is time to recognize that clean water is a much more valuable commodity
than previously appreciated and that we should price it accordingly.
Two
positives will flow from this turn-about in attitude. First, full-cost
pricing will provide revenues to help maintain the water infrastructure.
Second, full-cost pricing will discourage people and businesses
from wasting water so profligately. Canadians now, drink about 200
million litres of water per day, and go through another 19 billion
litres daily for other purposes – the second-highest per capita
users in the world.
Full-cost
water will mean higher prices. But these are the real prices that
we have been avoiding. What we’ve saved in water and sewer
rates, we’ve been paying in deterioration of a basic municipal
service – clean water – and in ill health and worse.
Competence
and cost are the real challenges. It is essential to acknowledge
that the cash flow demands of Canada’s water infrastructure
are so high that many municipalities will have to invite the participation
of the private sector.
Government
regulation and private sector entrepreneurship could together meet
these challenges and restore our water systems to an even, clean
flow.
David
J. McGuinty is President and CEO of the National Round Table on
the Environment and the Economy.
Index
to Articles
|