forWater: NSERC Network for Forested Drinking Water Source Protection Technologies

Drinking water is one of society's most critical water needs and delivery of safe drinking water-security-is anational strategic priority. Most Canadians are just becoming aware how fragile this essential resource is andthe potentially catastrophic effects climate change and high energy costs can have on drinking water security.To reduce risks to public health, Health Canada relies on the "multi-barrier approach" to prevent or reduce thecontamination of drinking water from source to tap. All variations of this framework identify source waterprotection (SWP) for risk prevention and in-plant treatment technologies for risk management. Notably, all ofthe barriers in this framework must be effective to ensure drinking water security. Climate change-associateddisturbances (wildfires, hurricanes, floods) have revealed alarming inadequacies in current implementations ofthe multi-barrier approach. These disturbances are causing increasingly variable or deteriorated source quality,and challenging in-plant treatment technologies beyond design and operational response capacities, to the pointof service disruptions. Water industry consensus points to the pressing need for new SWP technologies forclimate change adaptation to ensure secure community water systems. In Canada, effective SWP must focus onforested source watersheds because that is where the drinking water for most urban, rural, and Indigenouscommunities originates. Healthy forests typically produce high quality water-the value of natural storage andfiltration of water by global forests has been estimated at $4.1 trillion. Forest management approaches havebeen suggested as SWP technologies and include thinning or prescribed burning for pre-emptive risk reductionor reactive effects mitigation of potentially catastrophic disturbances. While forest management impacts onwater have been well studied, little if any of that work has focused specifically on drinking water treatability,which will likely vary in regionally. The forWater Network will provide new knowledge regarding the impactsof different forest management strategies on drinking water source quality and treatability to assess theirsuitability as SWP technologies across the major ecological/forest regions of Canada.