City of Kamloops working with province; few solutions for Noble Creek Irrigation System users

KAMLOOPS – The length of a AAA battery is the difference between having water and not for many of the farmers who use the Noble Creek Irrigation System (NCIS).

“We are about four centimetres above our trigger point for activation right now,” said City of Kamloops Utility Services Manager Greg Wightman. “We need a geodetic elevation of 344 meters in the river to operate that system and we are at 344 meters and 4 centimetres right now so we are going to be in a situation of not having enough water to run that system very shortly.”

During a closed meeting last month, the Kamloops city council voted to decommission the NCIS used by many farms in the area due to erosion concerns.

Farmers in the area were supposed to have water for their crops until the end of September. However, their supply is likely to end very soon.

“For me, this is food security and for them to cut off our water is [death],” Tricia Sullivan, the owner of Sullindeo Farm told CFJC News. “I can’t believe the city would be so irresponsible and that’s what I’m doing to call it, to take the NCIS water system out of sync.”

The city and irrigation subscribers must now find an alternative to the NCIS.

Farmers like Dieter Dudy from Thistle Farm believe they won’t survive what will likely be a lengthy process.

“To try to have alternative measures for things like wells or a community system takes time because you have to have to go through a permitting process and you know as well as I do, the wheels of government move slowly. It’s not something that’s going to be a quick fix, like six-to-ten months,” Dudy said. “It’s going to be something that’s likely going to take three, four, five years before we have something adequate in place to replace the system that we have.”

Aside from a halt to river bed erosion or a rise in the river level, the City of Kamloops said the only alternative is working with the province to allow individual property owners to pump water under the city license.

“Unfortunately, with the complexity of our system and the way it’s designed, we don’t have an easy option just to extend a pipe out into the river. It’s not designed that way,” Wightman explained. “We are working with the Ministry of Forests staff and the province to see what options are available for customers.”