The Water Sustainability Act will be the first upgrade to water legislation in BC for over 100 years.
Rosie Simms is the Water Law and Policy Coordinator for the Polis Project at Vancouver Island University says only non-domestic ground water users will be asked to licence their wells, with monitoring and reporting regulations expected in the next phase of the act.
Rosie Simms joined Polis Project Co-Director Oliver Brandis at a lecture hosted by the Cowichan Watershed Board last week. When asked whether the new act could be useful in the fight against contaminated soil dumping at Shawnigan Lake, Brandis explained that the activity there is a water quality issue.
There are approximately 20 thousand ground water users in BC expected to be phased in to the system through the new act.
