North Shore Water Resilience Task Force

The goal of the North Shore Water Resilience Task Force is to ensure water supply resilience within the Ipswich River Watershed, while improving ecosystem health.

• Summer flows and groundwater levels in the watershed are naturally low, driven primarily by evapotranspiration during the growing season.
• Human demand is generally highest during the summer months, creating a supply-demand mismatch.
• On the ecological side, the key problem is that naturally low flows are further reduced to extremely low flows, beyond what the fish communities and other flora and fauna are adapted to, due to a myriad of human factors such as wastewater exports, water withdrawals, stormwater management, and potentially others.
• Climate change, including increasing drought frequency, is adding to the region’s water supply and ecological challenges.
• The Task Force provides a regional structure for collaborative and proactive engagement to protect the river and ensure all the communities relying on the watershed have water for the future. It is structured to help members:
  • explore a range of water supply alternatives to improve water supply resilience, including connecting to out of basin sources, increasing in-basin storage capacity, intermunicipal water sharing, and reducing demand through water conservation efforts;
  • use credible experts to better understand the effects of these alternatives on watershed hydrology and ecosystem health;
  • select one or more solutions for implementation;
  • work collectively toward realizing these solutions, addressing planning and logistics, regulatory requirements, governance and legal structures, and funding.
• The ultimate solution for the region will likely involve a multi-faceted approach.
• Two key aspects of the Task Force’s work will be addressing the substantial funding needed to pursue solutions and working with all relevant parties to find creative pathways through the legislative and regulatory landscape.

Elevator pitch can also be found on page 4 of the full narrative.