GRAND RIVER WATERSHED WATER FORUM

"More than 300 people are gathered for the daylong conference at Grand River Conservation Authority headquarters on Clyde Road in Cambridge." as per Saturday's K-W Record, written by Kevein Swaze. This is an excellent and thought provoking article in regards to our common water supply and needs. I was also glad to see a number of persons panning the Great Lakes Pipeline as an appropriate solution to either water quality or quantity issues. That which I did not care for was an apparent reliance on water treatment technologies or as it's also known as "end of the pipe" solutions. Far better to stop contaminants from entering either ground or surface water in the first place rather then focusing on how to remove them once they are there. That being said I would also suggest that we have long had greater technology for example to clean sewage than we've had money directed towards that end. How many sewage treatment plants in Ontario and Canada still only use Primary or Secondary treatment versus Tertiary treatment of sewage? How many of these plants routinely, once or twice a year, discharge raw sewage into our waterways including the Grand River? Unfortunately politicians and bureaucrats still excel at puffery while falling short on followup. Please also note my earlier postings here in the Elmira Advocate re: raw sewage discharges.