Ontario: Environmental Registry, March 6, 2015, a Technical Paper on the Environmental Activity and Sector Registry and Short-Term Water Takings.

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The Ontario provincial government has published a technical discussion paper which summarizes the proposed rationale for moving some specific short-term, non-recurring water taking activities from the Permit To Take Water process under the Ontario Water Resources Act to the self-registration process on the EAS. The impacted water taking activities are:

surface water-takings that are restricted to specific purposes for the taking and the location,or rate of the water-taking; and
short-term construction dewatering less than 400,000 L/day.

The ministry is seeking comments on the following:

clarifying that certain activities are not considered water-takings by the ministry - specifically: diverting a watercourse for the purpose of creating and maintaining a construction site located wholly or partially within the watercourse where the water is returned back to the watercourse; and
providing exceptions from Permit to Take Water (PTTW) requirements with conditions for the following:

pumping water for the purpose of creating and maintaining a construction site where the water that has been pumped is returned back to the same watercourse, if prescribed requirements for discharge are met
;a taking of water by means of a structure or works constructed for the the restoration, managing, conserving or enhancement of wetlands; and
a taking of water by means of an existing structure or works built across a watercourse if the structure or works is intended solely to allow all natural watercourse flow to pass freely over the crest of the structure. (i.e. a weir). The proposed exemption would not include any structures that are utilized in hydro-electric projects (i.e. waterpower projects).

Comments accepted until April 20, 2015.

Access the Registry posting (includes links to sources).

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