This article originally appeared on The Tyee.
Water experts across the country have reacted with anger and surprise to the closure of one of the nation’s most celebrated and effective water study programs at the University of Toronto’s Munk School of Global Affairs.
For 15 years, the Program on Water Issues (POWI), directed by Adele Hurley, brought together the nation’s best scientists and policy-makers to debate and report on the nation’s hot button water issues in an independent, non-partisan forum.
The timely topics included oil sands water withdrawals from the Athabasca River, groundwater monitoring, climate change, the future of the Columbia River Treaty, and the impacts of hydraulic fracking on groundwater.