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Water Allocations in the South Saskatchewan
River Basin
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SSRB area
Source: “Some SSRB info and Approved SSRB Water Management Plan Implementation Project,” Alberta Environment
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SSRB River Basins
Source: “Some SSRB info and Approved SSRB Water Management Plan Implementation Project,” Alberta Environment
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Current Allocation method
Source: “Some SSRB info and Approved SSRB Water Management Plan Implementation Project,” Alberta Environment
“FITFIR”
“First in time, first in right”
Oldest water licenses get priority over newest
Oldest licenses are the largest
Municipalities often have the oldest licenses
Licenses rarely sequential geographically
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Problems
Source: “Some SSRB info and Approved SSRB Water Management Plan Implementation Project,” Alberta Environment
All four river basins are oversubscribed.
Two river basins have experienced degraded environmental conditions by not meeting Instream Flow Needs (IFN).
Large amounts of water have to be moved between river basins to meet demand and agreements with Saskatchewan.
Economists believe FITFIR is not “economically” efficient.
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Goods
High Subtractability
Low Subtractability
LowExcludability
HighExcludability
PrivateGoods
Common PoolResources
PublicGoods
TollGoods
limited access CPR
Source: Adapted from Ostrom, Elinor (2005). Understanding Institutional Diversity. Princeton University Press. Princeton, NJ, U.S.A.
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Proposed solutions1) Free market approach based on Murray-Darling River Basin in Australia (new Water Act)
2) Leave existing Water Act intact, but increase Water Conservation Objectives (WCOs) and clawbacks on transfers
3) Community-based management/localized decision-making (minor changes to Water Act)
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IssuesMarket-based approaches ignore water is a common pool resource, not a private good.
Murray-Darling River Basin had severe environmental degradation during droughts.
Economists’ reports are overly optimistic?
Not a lot of political support for community-based management, but a lot of political support for market-based approaches.
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Proposed ModelingNeed to compare predicted outcomes against each other on the same playing field.
Use Institutional Analysis and Development framework to develop the rules based on the proposed solutions.
Test if conditions such as IFN are met.
Test economic outcomes.
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Proposed ModelingLikely choice would be agent based modeling, using the rules developing through IAD examination of the proposed solutions.
Model has to be able to handle both sequential and simultaneous deterministic and stochastic events and outcomes.
Localized failures can affect downstream agents.
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ParametersVolume of water licenses
Geographic location of water licenses
Priority numbers of water licenses
Inter-provincial and international water agreements
Inter-river basin transfers
Naturalized flow and natural recharges
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VariablesRainfall
Price of oil
Price of selling water license
Price of short term transfer of water license
Population growth
IFN/WCO levels