e-know.ca October 15, 2021
The Columbia Basin Water Hub is making significant progress towards achieving open data sharing in the Canadian Columbia Basin.
Recently the Water Hub acquired baseline water data from a proposed mining project in the Elk Valley that is currently under review with the provincial and federal governments
North Coal has been collecting baseline water data since planning for its Michel Coal Project started in 2013 and is the first mining company to sign a data sharing agreement with the Columbia Basin Data Hub.
“Having companies in the private sector share water data sets is an important component for providing the information needed by decision makers working to manage watershed and ecosystem health. There is a strong appetite for increased transparency with regards to water data while also keeping industry who impact water more accountable,” said Santiago Botero, Applied Innovation and Technology Manager for Living Lakes Canada. “The baseline data provided by North Coal is one of the first datasets that have come from industry, hopefully paving the way for more industrial datasets to be hosted in the Water Hub.”
Formally launched in March 2021, the Columbia Basin Water Hub is an innovative open data platform for housing water-related data collected in the Canadian Columbia Basin. The Water Hub also provides links to existing water data relevant to the Columbia Basin.
The overarching aim of the Water Hub is to make this data easily accessible to Indigenous and non-Indigenous decision makers, researchers, community groups and the public at large, to help build a holistic and transparent approach to water management as climate change continues to impact hydrological flows in the Basin region.
In the six-month period since its launch, over 151 water datasets from streams, rivers, lakes and wetlands across the Columbia Basin have been uploaded to the Water Hub. This data was collected and provided by 31 regional organizations.