Sustainable groundwater resources indicators applied to the Montérégie Est regional aquifer system, Quebec, Canada

René Lefebvre, Marc André Carrier, Alex Martin, Joshua Bleser, Christine Rivard, Roxane Lavoie, Édith Bourque, Michel Ouellet

In the proceedings of: GeoMontréal 2013: 66th Canadian Geotechnical Conference; 11th joint with IAH-CNC

Session: Groundwater Management I

ABSTRACT: The CCA (2009) report deals with the following question: The CCA concluded that sustainable groundwater management encompasses five interrelated goals: 1) Protection of groundwater supplies from depletion (Quantity); 2) Protection of groundwater quality from contamination (Quality); 3) Protection of ecosystem viability (Ecosystems); 4) Achievement of economic and social well-being (Well-being), and 4) Application of good governance (Governance). The CCA Panel also recommended the development of indicators related to sustainable management goals. In that perspective, the Canadian Council of Ministers of the Environment (CCME) developed indicators (Gordon, 2011) on the basis of the work done by a joint Unesco-IAEA-IAH committee (Vrba & Lipponen, 2007). The CCME also developed a pilot project to test the application of the indicators across Canada on the basis of varied hydrogeological conditions as well as data availability. In Quebec, the Environment Ministry (Ministère du Développement durable, de lEnvironnement, de la Faune et des Parcs, MDDEFP) supported a project aiming to test the development of sustainable management indicators using the maps and data provided by its systematic groundwater resource assessment program. In 2009, the MDDEFP started a program (Programme d'acquisition de connaissances sur les eaux souterraines, PACES) aiming to provide a systematic picture of groundwater resources at the regional scale to insure informed management and protection. These projects are carried out by universities in collaboration with regional partners, such as regional municipalities and river basin organizations (Organismes de bassin versant, OBV) (Palmer et al., 2011). PACES projects integrate available and new data and generate a uniform database and maps providing a wide range of information about the state of groundwater resources. However, it is a challenge to transfer such specialized information to regional stakeholders who are not groundwater specialists. Indicators that can integrate the specialized data and inform in a simplified way about the state of groundwater resources were thought as one of the means that could favor the transfer of PACES results to regional water stakeholders. The PACES project in Montérégie Est was used to test the applicability of the CCME sustainable management indicators based on PACES data as the project was being completed (Carrier et al., 2013). Montérégie Est covers 9 000 km2, three large watersheds, 9 regional municipalities and 106 municipalities with a population of 792 000 inhabitants. This area also offers quite varied hydrogeological contexts: St. Lawrence sedimentary platform, Monterigian hills, Appalachian piedmont and Appalachian Mountains. The CCME indicators were generated, as well as other indicators covering all CCA sustainable management objectives. The following figures illustrate some of the indicators generated. The relevance of indicators was verified through workshops involving regional water stakeholders (Martin et al. 2013). The indicators were first found to be of great interest as communication tools, as they conveyed better than specialized maps the information about the state of groundwater resources. Since many of these indicators integrated much information in a simple and concise way, they were also found to provide a more complete and balanced picture of some groundwater resources conditions. The indicators also provided a way to identify the most important issues related to CCA objectives as well as the areas where these issues have to be dealt with in priority. The indicators thus provide a basis for the development of sustainable groundwater management at the regional scale. If these indicators can be updated regularly, they will also allow monitoring of the evolution of the state of groundwater resources and of its governance. Finally, if such indicators were generated across all regions covered by PACES projects, they would allow the comparison of the state of groundwater resources across Quebec, and thus guide governmental actions related to their management. REFERENCES Canadian Council of Academies (CCA), 2009. Sustainable Management of Groundwater in Canada. Carrier, M.-A., Lefebvre, R., Rivard, C., Parent, M., et al., 2013. Portrait des ressources en eau souterraine en Montérégie Est, Québec, Canada. PACES Project, INRS Report R-1412, June 2013, 283 pp., appendix and maps. Gordon, S., 2011. Sustainable groundwater management: Preliminary approach for assessing the sustainability of groundwater. Gordon Groundwater Consultancy, Report submitted to CCME, May 2, 2011. 41 pp.

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