Canadians Continue to Use Water at Alarming Rates

When it comes to water conservation, Canadians appear to talk the talk, but don't walk the walk. At least that's the impression I'm left with after reading the latest Canadian Water Attitudes Study, a national opinion survey on Canadians' awareness, perceptions and habits related to freshwater.

More than eight in 10 think Canada will have a freshwater shortage problem if we do not pay attention to conservation. Yet Canadians continue to waste it at alarming rates, using five times more water per day than they think they do.

Canadians believe they use an average of 66 litres of water per day, for drinking, showering, bathing, toilet flushing, laundry and dishwashing. But actual consumption is about 329 litres per day. In fact, their water habits actually worsened in 2009. For example, the length of showers taken by Canadians increased from 2008 to 2009. Canadians rank second only to the United States in terms of highest per capita water use in the developed world. In comparison, Europeans consume less than half of the water Canadians do.

Government, and NGOs like Nature Canada, have a role to play in countering misconceptions about water. This includes the belief that Canada has an unending supply of water. While Canada holds 20 per cent of the world's fresh water supply, it holds only 6.5 per cent of the world's renewable fresh water, and much of it is locked away in our North, inaccessible, for all intents and purposes, to our cities in the South. Nearly 70% of the earth's fresh water exists in the form of glaciers and permanent snow cover. (Check out other water facts)

Another myth is that reducing water consumption will have a major impact on our lives. It's remarkably easy to reduce your daily water consumption by 38 liters a day. Those who have signed our Water Pledge are already doing it.


Some highlights from the poll:

Attitudes toward conservation

• Ninety-five per cent of Canadians believe it is important to conserve freshwater on an ongoing basis
• Most people (86 per cent) believe they are making reasonable efforts to conserve freshwater
  Only 30 per cent believe that corporations, businesses and industry are making reasonable efforts to conserve freshwater
• Significantly more Canadians put effort into electricity conservation than water conservation (28 per cent versus 3 per cent)
• Only 40 per cent of the population knows how much they pay for water each month, versus 73 per cent who know what they pay for electricity

Spring Guidelines for Living by the Water

If you live by a lake, river or stream, or own a cottage near water, check out this seasonal guide for maintaining your waterfront property. It's a good way to protect your investment and the environment.

The information originally appeared in On the Living Edge: Your Handbook for Waterfront Living, by Sarah Kipp and Clive Calloway, as part of the Living by Water project.

Here are several tips just in time for Spring:

High Water
Prepare in the fall to manage spring runoff. Even in low snow areas, meltwater from upstream may add to runoff through your property.

Septic Systems
Conserve water to reduce the volume going into your septic leaching bed. High spring water tables and saturated ground may reduce the effectiveness of your system.

If you suspect that the water table is higher than your septic leaching bed, contact a septic inspector. You could be contaminating surface water.

Pump your tank late in the summer. If you pump when the water table is high, the empty tank could float up.

Flood Preparedness
You local Conservation Authority will likely have maps that can identify if you are in a flood risk area. If your home or property is at risk from imminent flooding contact your municipality or local emergency services for assistance.

Spring Mud
Avoid using a muddy driveway. Rake out ruts before they dry and harden.
Use planks or boards to create temporary boardwalks. This saves compacting the soil and helps keep mud out of your house and car.

Docks
Hold off putting docks into the water until ground conditions have hardened, to prevent damage to the shoreline.

Spring Clean-up
Remove human-made garbage; it can harm wildlife and their habitat, interfere with your recreation and it’s ugly! But leave nature’s debris; logs, branches and trees that have washed up on your shoreline or beach. Resist collecting them for firewood – they are essential to protecting your shoreline from erosion.

Ruby-throated Hummingbird: March Photo of the Month

It's spring, and folks will likely see a lot more activity around their feeders as migratory birds return to their summer breeding grounds throughout Canada. One long distance migrant, the ruby-throated hummingbird, isn't likely to appear until May, but we still thought we'd feature the species as our Photo of the Month. Thank you, April Stampe, for the great pic!

The ruby-throated hummingbird is the most common and widely distributed hummingbird in Canada. It's the only species of hummingbird that breeds in the eastern deciduous and mixed forests of eastern North America.

The legs of a ruby-throated hummingbird are too short for it to walk or hop, but it can shuffle along a perch. When it comes time to scratch its head or neck, the hummingbird raises its foot over its wing to scratch.

Ruby-throated hummingbirds eat flower nectar, small insects and spiders, tree sap, and will eat at hummingbird feeders. It hovers at flowers to feed, and can beat its wings 55-75 times per second!

The hummingbirds show preference to feeder locations but not to feeder colours. They also catch insects in flight, pluck them from leaves, and pluck spiders from their webs. Hummingbirds extract the nectar by inserting their long, extensible, tubular tongue into the flower’s honey wells, or in larger flowers. It pierces the neck of the blossom to extract the drop of nectar. Brightly coloured flowers (red or orange) that show up well in dark shady places are more attractive to hummingbirds.

The ruby-throated hummingbird populations appear stable. Poor weather, such as cold and storms, are the most serious threats.

Read more about the ruby-throated hummingbird in our online bird guide.

As always you can check out previous photos of the month on our archives page.

UPDATE: Some of our readers rightly pointed out that when you're putting your hummingbird feeders out this spring, be sure to avoid using artificial colouring in your nectar solution, which is both unnecessary and possibly harmful to birds. (The same is true of honey.) A sugar and water solution made at home is acceptable, though it is very important to change the solution every three days or so to prevent mold from forming. But the best way to attract hummingbirds to your yard is to grow native plants that supply real, natural nectar.

U.S. State of the Birds Report has Warning Signs for Canadian Birds

A fascinating look at the State of the Birds in the United States has just been released by several government, NGO and academic partners, including our BirdLife partner in the U.S., National Audubon Society. The report uses data from three continent-wide bird monitoring programs, as well as species specific survey data, to create bird population indicators for major U.S. habitats.

The results indicate significant conservation challenges. Every U.S. habitat is home to birds of conservation concern. Particularly worrisome is the status of birds in Hawaii and ocean birds. These populations need immediate and concerted conservation effort to safeguard them. However, declines are taking place in other habitats as well: populations in grasslands and aridland habitats show the most rapid decline over the past 40 years, and forest birds are also declining.

The good news? Wetland dependent species, waterfowl, and some wintering coastal birds are increasing, demonstrating the positive effects of decades of conservation action aimed at wetland preservation. And birds that have adapted to urban habitats are thriving, demonstrating the importance of creating and maintaining greenspaces in urban settings to benefit birds.

There are important messages in this report about the status of Canadian bird species as well. Many Arctic nesting species are of significant conservation concern. Some Arctic landbirds and seabirds, and many shorebirds, are declining in this region. Habitat loss in the Arctic from resource extraction and global warming is a major concern. The Ivory Gull, pictured below, which nests in northern Canada and is dependent on sea ice, has undergone a dramatic population decline just in the last decade.

Canada is also home to many of the grassland, forest and shoreline species that are highlighted as conservation concern in the report. The habitat pressures facing declining birds like Eastern Meadowlarks, Bobolinks, Wood Thrushes, Whip-poor-wills, Rusty Blackbirds and Semipalmated Sandpipers are found in Canada too. Because these birds, and many others, cross our border (and often have the majority of their breeding range in Canada) we share conservation responsibility for them.

Visit the State of the Birds website here, or download the full report. While you're on the State of the Birds website, take a bit of time to watch the beautiful and powerful video that talks about the findings of the report.

photo: Ivory Gull by Simon Stirup, BirdLife

Earth Day Canada Hometown Heroes

As April 22 approaches, Earth Day Canada is calling out for a new Earth Day Hometown Hero.

The charity is looking for environmental leaders who have achieved results on the frontlines of the environmental movement, people they call the "unsung heroes" who will inspire others to go green.

The winner of the Hometown Heroes Award receives $10 000 — $5 000 to keep and $5 000 to donate to the environmental cause of their choice.

Last year's Hometown Hero was David Donnelly, a Toronto lawyer who has provided counsel to some of Canada’s leading charitable organizations, including Environmental Defence, the Ontario Greenbelt Alliance, and the Green Gravel Coalition.

Donnelly led the fight to stop urban sprawl surrounding Lake Simcoe, which threatens the health of the watershed. In the spring of 2007 David represented the Innisfil District Association in its campaign to oppose the development of a proposed 2,000 unit resort, championship golf course and marina.

While national organizations (like Nature Canada) help bring about lasting, systemic change by fighting for strong environmental laws, real change can also happen on a small scale in communities across the country. Contests like this one shine a much deserved light on those individuals who are leading by example.

Consider nominating someone you know, or better yet, if you think you're a hometown hero, nominate yourself! (check out the rules first to see if you can!)

Business Sectors See Climate Change Risks and Opportunities

The Carbon Disclosure Project (CDP) is a not-for-profit organisation that holds the largest database of corporate climate change information in the world. If you are so inclined, you can read analyst reports, published annually, that provide detailed analyses of how the largest companies around the globe are responding to climate change.

Combining the well-known sentiment from U.S. Supreme Court Justice Louis Brandeis that sunlight is the best disinfectant, with the biz school dictum that what gets measured gets managed, the CBD believes that making information about a company's climate change strategy available to policy makers, investors and the general public will encourage companies to reduce emissions and climate change impacts.

Last month execs at the 200 largest companies (by market capitalization) traded on the Toronto Stock Exchange were asked to assess the risks and opportunities that climate change presented in their respective sectors.

The results? Not surprisingly, high carbon footprint sectors like oil and gas, mining and forestry saw a lot of risk, while the financial services sector -- eager to cash in on new carbon trading markets -- saw plenty of opportunity.

Read more about the survey results.

Questioning Carbon Capture and Storage: the fossil fuel industry's Holy Grail

Yesterday in the Globe and Mail, John Ibbitson described the problems facing the US coal industry with regard to reducing the greenhouse gases (mainly carbon dioxide) that are produced when coal is burned. Canada and the USA are investing hundreds of millions of public dollars in carbon capture and storage (CCS), the holly grail of the fossil fuel industry. In Canada CCS is trumpeted by politicians as the solution to greenhouse gas issues associated with the environmentally destructive oil sands industry in northern Alberta. The Globe article describes the sputtering start and stop attempts south of the border to construct CCS facilities, aborted in the end due to reportedly exorbitant costs that could “double the cost of coal-generated electricity.” The challenges faced by this technology include concentrating the carbon dioxide at source, which requires massive energy inputs, safe transport to the storage area, and secure storage. Pilot projects to capture and store carbon dioxide are underway in various countries, most notably in Norway and right here in Canada in Weyburn Saskatchewan and also in Alberta. The approach at Weyburn is to inject highly concentrated carbon dioxide gas from coal plants in North Dakota into subterranean oil fields to facilitate the extraction of oil.

Carbon dioxide is present in the atmosphere at very low levels as a result of cellular respiration of animals and the weathering of carbon-containing minerals (carbonates) such as limestone. The air outside contains on average 380 parts per million (ppm) (.038%), a rise of approximately 100 ppm in the last 200 years. Carbon dioxide molecules trap heat, which is why C02 is considered a greenhouse gas. The rising level of C02 caused by the burning of fossil fuels after the industrial revolution is believed to be the principle cause of climate change, and particularly global warming. Plants absorb CO2 and convert it to simple sugars and oxygen through photosynthesis. This is why deforestation is also considered a cause of global warming because is reduces the earth’s capacity to remove C02 from the atmosphere. The carbon captured by plants ends up in living tissue, bones, shells, soils, sedimentary rock, and of course “fossil fuels” such as coal and oil which all can be traced back to plants.

C02 becomes toxic to life as it becomes more concentrated. Effects on human health are well documented after concentrations above 2%, and likely effects such as drowsiness are experienced at levels below this. Because C02 displaces oxygen and is heavier than oxygen, it “pools” in places such as underground storage areas in barns or tanks used for storing waste. Many people have succumbed to C02 gas when entering one of these potential death traps. C02 is odourless meaning that detection of this hazard by smell for example (as is the case is hydrogen sulphide), is not possible. There are several other hazards associated with the transportation and storage of concentrated C02 that should cause us to pause when considering how to dispose of the “captured” gas from these processes such as its violent reaction when exposed to air.

The viability of carbon capture and storage is still unproven. As it is currently understood and practiced, CCS is extremely costly and could double the cost of energy. The safe storage of the C02 is fraught with many concerns and problems associated with safety and risk. Despite these concerns, the recent federal budget, supported by rhetoric from our political leaders, includes a massive investment in CCS. In fact the government had the audacity to consider this investment as a major plank in their “green” platform. Since these are our tax dollars and this is our planet, as a society we must scrutinize these types of investments and consider whether they truly are in our best interest. Massive public funds going toward carbon capture and storage obstructs the conversion of our economy to one that is ecologically sustainable by diverting public investment from technologies such as solar, geothermal and wind that do not entail the same risks, and which directly address climate change, the greatest environmental challenge facing humanity.

Eat Your Greens

Check out these images of a robin catching his meal -- gulp! The pictures come from Jim Dubois, who has his own Web site, theineleganteagle.com. Jim's title for this image series is better than anything I'd write: Eat your greens...and your browns.

Look closely, you can catch one last glimpse of the grub...

On to the next course...

Thanks for sharing Jim.

Quick Poll: Wildlife Watching Top Winter Activity

In our latest highly unscientific (but fun!) Quick Poll we asked our online community members how they like to spend their winters.

Do they grab the wax and head for the slopes, or cosy up to the fire and stay toasty indoors? Do they start building the outdoor hockey rink or start packing their bags for Florida?

Turns out many of you see the winter months as a good time to wildlife watch. According to our Quick Poll results, 41% of voters chose wildlife watching as their favourite winter activity. While the next largest group - 24% - preferred staying indoors, a review of the posted comments reveal many people actually do their wildlife watching from the comfort of their home, spying the birds, squirrels and other urban wildlife through their kitchen windows.

Check out the full results here.

We also asked where people like to go during winter, either to celebrate the season or escape it. A sampling of some of the responses is below, but my favourite: "I live in the Northwest Territories. I don't go anywhere for winter, it comes to me."

Stay in my own back yard and area of Deep Cove, Nova Scotia. If I go for warmer climate I go to ECO/Bird watching areas, like Costa Rica etc.

I walk with the Toronto Field Naturalists along Toronto's waterfront and in ravines or cemeteries to observe birds, and identify winter trees. I also go into my local ravine, The Don Valley to check on the wood ducks, kingfishers and herons.

Walking around the many beautiful parks and natural beauty spots around Vancouver Island, watching the birds and waterfowl.

In March, my friend and I go to New England where he skis at Cannon Mountain in New Hampshire and I enjoy reading and loafing at an excellent inn - Homestead, a B&B at Sugar Hill, near Franconia.

We stay pretty much at home in the winter. Love to watch the eagles that hang around our back yard. They nest here in the summer, great hearing their family squabbles. In the winter they fly effortlessly in circles above and sometimes chase each other.

I go to the Atlantic shores to look for birds, seals, etc. Always something of interest around. Today, I saw an Ivory Gull (really, I'm not kidding).

I love winter and the snow. Ice skating has always been one of my favorites. But just a nice, brisk walk outdoors is totally awesome. Bird feeding during the winter months is exciting too!

I live in the boreal forest of northern Saskatchewan and work further north. This offers me the chance firsthand to view all sorts of wildlife from diving ospreys to grey wolves and bears.

Hiking on the East Coast Trail in Newfoundland with my brother and dog, including out to Gunners Cove to see and hear the waves crash onto the cliffs across Freshwater Bay while standing in the sun drinking hot cocoa.

Read all of the comments here. And we now have a new Quick Poll up on our web site (check out our home page) -- If convicted, what penalty should Syncrude receive for the deaths of 500 ducks last year?