Manitoba Thrilled W. US Court Decision Blocking Diversion From NoDak Into Canadian Watershed

[hatrack]

Manitoba has won another round in its long-running legal dispute with the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation over a water-diversion project that could allow invasive species from the United States into Lake Winnipeg and the rest of the Hudson Bay drainage basin.

The province has been trying to stop the project in nearby North Dakota to transfer water from the Missouri River that would ultimately flow into the Gulf of Mexico. The project would bring the water across the Continental Divide, into a parched area of North Dakota from where it would flow northward into Canada toward the Arctic. The water slated to be transferred - 13.3 million tonnes a year through a 72-kilometre-long pipeline - would be used around Minot, N.D. It would drain into the Souris River, which flows into Manitoba.

But the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia has ordered the bureau to take a "hard look" at the threat the water transfer poses to Canada's environment, as well as water levels in the Missouri River. It is also keeping in place an injunction currently stopping completion of the controversial project. In its decision, the court said the consequences of having foreign species move into Canada "might be catastrophic."

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The legal dispute highlights the lack of legislation in Canada and the U.S. barring the movement of water from one drainage area to another, says Adele Hurley, director of the program on water issues at the Munk Centre for International Studies at the University of Toronto. She said the two countries need to develop laws to "keep water in its natural basins" because transfers "simply set off a new round of environmental issues, such as the movement of invasive species."

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http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/national/manitoba-welcomes-us-ruling-against-water-pipeline-plan/article1495785/

[pansypoo53219]

1. fuck with mother nature

at your peril.