5 aa i i
NEWS photos Cindy Goodman

KEVIN TORGERSON guides bottles over a conveyor belt before they are filled

Sunday, August 7, 1994 - North Shore News - 3

_ Tapping clean
water solutions

Alternatives sought for cleaning dirty water

HILE ENVIRONMENTALISTS and the Greater Vancouver Water
District do battle over forest management practices — and the
effect this does er does not have on the quality of our drinking
water — a growing number of people are taking drinking water into their

own hands.

By Greg Feiton

Contributing Writer

When the News spoke with
Don Wood, vice-president of
Coastal Mountain Water, last
May, he said there had been
“phenomenal growth” in resi-
dential sates of bottled water,
especially on the North Shore.

“Bottled water is the fastest
growing segment of the beverage
industry in North America,” said
Wood. “People ure looking for
alternatives to coffee and pop,

(and) don’t want to drink water
that is chiorinated and has sedi-

ment.”

MATT HARRISON of North Vancouver-based
Coastal Water Co. transports a rack of water.

Coastal Mountain is one of 20 water delivery services in the Lower Mainland. Over the last
three months, Wood's partner, Bill Eberly, said water consumption has risen by 30% and the
number of new customers has doubled.

However, bottled water is only one option available to Lower Mainland residents who want
something purer than GVWD water. Another is point-of-use purification systems.

Reg Watt is a Maple Ridge purifier with 600 customers who uses a hollow ceramic candle
filled with activated carbon to purify municipal water. He said the sub-micron, unglazed
diatomaceous clay candle, made by Royal Doulton, can stop bacteria as small as 22 microns as
well as asbestos fibres and giardia, (“Beaver fever”).

Once the ceramic layer steps the bacteria, Watt ‘said the activated carbon filter takes care of
the hydrocarbons, like chlorine and chlorine byproducts such as trihalomethanes.

Because our water is so turbid, Watt said the carbon filters have to be replaced frequently. A
system installed on a pop machine at an Overwaitea food store, he said, plugged up in three

minutes,

Phillip Dickey runs H&M Enterprises in Coquitlam and specializes in ionization. {n this
method, electrically charged copper and silver electrodes are inserted into a recirculated water
source. The purification takes place when low-level Cu and Ag ions come into contact with

bacteria.

with drinking water. Bottled water is the fastest growing segment of the bever-

age Industry in North America.

“Copper is a natural algicide and silver is a natural anti-bacterial agent,” he said. “The cop-
per effectively pierces the outer membrane of an algae spore, for example, and kills it; the silver

See Ionization page §

_ Watershed management changes advocated

N i989, the Greater
Vancouver Water District
(GVWD) appointed a
panel of eight technical
experts to conduct a compre-
hensive assessment of its
watershed policies and man-
agement practices — the
first such review in 25 years.

By Greg Felton
Contributing Writer

The specialists came from vari-
ous disciplines: water quality (two).
wildlife (two), forest soils, silvicul-
ture, forest hydrology and fisheries.
There were also three other review-
ers: two from the department of
forestry at the University of British
Columbia and a resource manage-
ment consultant.

The scope of their investigations
focused on three primary concerns:
watershed control and security;
access development within the
watershed; and forest and vegeta-
tion cover management.

The end product was the August
1991 Final Watershed Management
Evaluation and Policy Review, also
known as the Final Summary
Report (FSR).

According to the report: “The

CALL US:

983-2208

panel took a historical look over the
past 25 years to determine if
GVWD had adhered to the adminis-
trative board's directives and the
terms of the Amending Indenture
and Original Lease. The panel
found that GVWD has been con-
ducting a fundamentally sound
watershed management program to
Meet its current objec-
tives.

The panel particular-
ly praised the GVWD's
restrictive security and
access policy for con-
tributing to high water
quality.

Nevertheless, the
panel generally criti-
cized current practices
for a lack of vision,
especially in forest
management and access
development (harvest-
ing and road construction): “it is
not feasible to determine if the cur-
rent program will meet its goal of a
healthier, multi-aged forest with
diverse species because there is no
specific long-term plan to achieve
the envisioned forest cover.”

The report’s authors also wrote
that there was a need for better
information on the status and health
of the forest and land resources,
especially related to insects, dis-

ease, fire susceptibility and soil sta-
bility: “A comprehensive ecological
inventory is needed to form the
basis for long-range plan.,” .
As for the effect of harvesting,
road construction and slope stabili-
ty on water quality, the FSR said
the GVWD needs a more refined
system than the Aqua-Terra

66... the panel generally criticized
current practices for a lack of vision,
especially in forest management and
access development (harvesting and

road construction). 99

Classification System (ATCS):
“The primary objective of the
ATCS was to provide a stratifica-
tion for forest management, and
some attention was paid to slope
stability. While the ATCS may not
be as intensive a slope stability fea-
ture as desired, it does provide an
overview of slope stability hazards
on GVWD watersheds.”

The consensus of the panel was
that the GVWD had to change its

management philosophy and that a
low-level watershed management
policy should be adopted.

The primary difference, it said,
was that timber stand stability,
rather than timber quotas, would be
the driving principle. The panel
said the short-term water quality
tisk from this approach would be
“low to medium”
with a “low” long-
term risk.

Other options

were deemed to have
higher water quality
risks:
B Reactive manage-
ment: Low to medi-
um short-term risk;
medium long term
risk.

Medium potential
for catastrophic fire,
erosion, and
disease/insect infestation. Fire sup-
pression practised, but no fuel man-
agement: uniform-aged forest sus-
ceptible to disease; low risk of ero-
sion and landslides (no new roads).
Bl “Hands off’: medium short-term
risk; high long-term risk. High
potential for catastrophic fire, ero-
sion, and disease/insect infestation.

No fire prevention or fuel sup-
pression practised; uniform-aged
forest highly susceptible to disease:

THIS WEEK’S QUESTION:
Are you in favor of the use of residential water meters?

no rehabilitation of landslide areas.
@ High-level “pro-active”: medi-
um to high short- and long-term
risks. .
Medium potential for fire, soil
erosion, and disease/insect infesta-
tion.

Fire suppression and fuel man-
agement practised, but level of
activity can create more fuel and
increase fire potential, no species
diversity in a production forest such
as this; erosion control practised,
but level of road construction and
harvesting increases potential for
landslides.

While the panel recommended
the GVWD change its management
philosophy, it said that current
(1991) practices had little effect on
water quality: “The GVWD is gen-
erally using best management prac-
tices in harvesting activities, and
the panel found no evidence to con-
clude that present harvesting prac-
tices have been a significant
causative factor of excess turbidity
in GVWD sources.”

But according to Will Koop.
critic of watershed logging and
author of Wake Up Vancouver!,
statements such as this “seem to
dance around the question of
admission” that the GVWD's prac-

See Panel's page §