REGION INVESTS $15.1 MILLION TOWARD WATER CAPACITY ISSUE

The Region of Waterloo is hurrying to install a $15.1 million temporary plug into a water capacity crisis that effectively hung a “Closed for Business” sign over one of Canada’s fastest-growing tech hubs.  

The Region of Waterloo council has approved using more than $15 million in capital funding to pay for a project that could offer a short-term solution to the ongoing water capacity issues. The project involves H2O Innovation Inc., a water and wastewater treatment company based in Oakville, installing three temporary ultrafiltration containers, each with an estimated flow rate of 50 litres per second, at the Mannheim Water Treatment Plant.   

The Region of Waterloo relies heavily on groundwater for its municipal drinking water supply and regularly monitors for contaminants, including per- and polyfluoroalkyl (PFAS) such as perfluorooctanesulfonic acid (PFOS) and perfluorooctanoic acid (PFOA). These “forever chemicals” have been detected in water systems across Canada and are subject to Health Canada drinking water guidelines.

As regulatory standards evolve and monitoring continues, the Region evaluates treatment options to ensure drinking water remains safe and meets provincial and federal requirements. Granular activated carbon (GAC) filtration is a recognized method for reducing PFAS concentrations and is one of the technologies commonly considered by water utilities when addressing these compounds.  

The urgency of the situation was discussed during a recent community meeting. Kevin Thomason, vice-chair of the Grand River Environmental Network, warned that the system is running on a razor-thin margin.  

“If there’s a water main break or something that may take out five per cent or ten per cent of our supply…that suddenly means taps are going dry and  people aren’t getting service or a hospital isn’t getting water or a fire hydrant isn’t getting water,” Thomason said.  

“So, we certainly don’t want to be running so close to our capacity,” he said. 

The Waterloo Region staff members explain that any delays in approval could result in significant subsequent delays to project completion, which looks to regain lost capacity at that plant. They are seeking approvals before a detailed design gets completed.  

The project costs will be included in the 2026 capital budget and funded through the Water Capital Reserve Fund.  

The current-year costs of this project are significantly higher in the report presented to regional council at the Special Regional Council Meeting held on Friday, Feb. 6, 2026, compared to the projections detailed in a report from late January 2026. At that time, when the council was presented with a variety of potential options, the current-year impact on the capital budget was $2 million.  

Projections for the total project cost remained around $16 million. The $2 million price for engineering services and $2.5 million for electrical work are preliminary estimates.  

Beyond the immediate infrastructure bottleneck, a sedimentation capacity constraint at the Mannheim plant has choked the water supply by 300 litres per second, which revealed deeper concerns regarding the Waterloo Moraine.  

Regional Councillor Joe Nowak plans to introduce a blue belt motion to provide permanent provincial protection for the Moraine’s high volume recharge areas (HVRAs). These specific, porous sections of land are the primary sponges that refill the region’s aquifers and the motion aims to shield them from urban sprawl to prevent long-term water depletion.   

“We really need to look at this in conjunction with solving the capacity issue,” Nowak said. “Advocacy doesn’t have to be negative…we have this issue, we’re probably not going to be the only groundwater source community that has this issue.”  

As the region pivots to this emergency implementation, Kenneth Brothers officially joined the Region on Feb. 23, 2026, as the Interim Commissioner of Water Services and Wastewater Operations. An internationally recognized professional engineer and a Fellow of the International Water Association, Brothers is tasked with overseeing the immediate repairs and fast-tracking the infrastructure upgrades needed to restore development capacity.   

“Yes, we had a plan… but as with a lot of things, I think what we’re all seeing is there’s no holistic infrastructure plan that accompanies all of these things,” Brothers said.  

During a Grand River Watershed community meeting on Feb. 6, 2026 regarding the impacts of Bill 23, experts discussed whether the region could simply tap into deep bedrock aquifers, which are water-bearing rock layers found deeply buried below the surface, to solve the water capacity issue.  

Hydrogeologist Michael Friend and aquatic ecologist Jack Imhoff cautioned that this water is fundamentally different from the fresh, rain-fed “sponge” of the Waterloo Moraine.  

Because this deep water resides in the Salina Formation, a prehistoric underground rock layer composed of ancient sea salt and gypsum, it absorbed extreme levels of salt over millennia. While technically fixable through desalination, the process is prohibitively expensive and produces a massive amount of toxic brine waste that the Region has no safe way to dispose of without damaging the watershed the meeting sought to protect.   

“I look forward to joining the Region of Waterloo as we navigate through this pivotal moment,” Brothers said, emphasizing his commitment to “long-term water sustainability” for a population projected to reach one million by 2051.  

Hey does anyone out there know about the architecture underlying the #regionOfWaterloo 's Engage platform? There's a link off the bottom of the page to https://www.socialpinpoint.com/ . I'm finding a lot of circularity in their web site that just loops back to essentially, contact them for a sales pitch.

I'm not a huge fan of the engage platform, mainly because it's closed, and there's a great deal of friction on citizens just getting in there and finding out what's going on.

WATER CAPACITY CONSTRAINTS FORCE TEMPORARY HALT ON NEW DEVELOPMENTS

As of January 2026, the Region of Waterloo reached a critical bottleneck. Severe water capacity constraints within the Mannheim Service Area, which encompasses Kitchener, Waterloo and parts of Cambridge, forced a temporary halt on all new development approvals. 

Although existing water supplies are safe, the water supply system lacks the necessary buffers for repairs, prompting the need for emergency plans regarding new infrastructure and enhanced water supplies. 

While the Region of Waterloo struggles with population growth and land development, Peter Huck, distinguished professor emeritus at the University of Waterloo, notes that the Mannheim district relies on a complex Integrated Urban System. 

“The Region of Waterloo is using two types of water,” Huck said. “One is groundwater from about 100 scattered wells, and the other is surface water from the Grand River treated at the Mannheim Treatment Plant.” 

The Mannheim Plant began it’s operations in 1994.  

This creates a technical bottleneck where the wells are at their full capacity and increasing river draw is limited by the need to protect downstream ecosystems. 

The Region initially identified the issue in November 2025 and announced the findings in December 2025, citing that rapid population growth and aging infrastructure led to demand exceeding available capacity.  

The issue has been further discussed and detailed in a Jan. 13, 2026, meeting of the Region of Waterloo’s Sustainability, Infrastructure, and Development committee, where staff confirmed the need for a revised water supply strategy and infrastructure investment. 

During the Jan.13 committee meeting, Sam Nabi, Director of Hold the Line WR, challenged the Region’s ‘surprise’ at the crisis, noting that the 2015 Master Plan had already identified the infrastructure and pumping stations necessary to bolster the Integrated Urban System.  

Nabi questioned why these long-planned interconnections failed to prevent the current bottleneck and challenged the lack of groundwater context in regional planning. He argued against Provincial oversight, calling instead for a collaborative solution led by the local municipalities directly affected by the freeze. 

Huck said that the current 60 per cent operating capacity may be due to equipment that requires more upgrading or replacing it to restore it to its full design potential. 

While Nabi focused on historical planning, Joseph Puopolo, co-CEO of Polocorp Inc., laid out a stark economic forecast for the Region. Puopolo warned that halting development approvals would trigger a “dry-up of municipal development charges, rendering capital budgets irrelevant and driving skilled trades and private investment out of the Region toward more stable municipalities. 

Additionally, he said that investments will be directed elsewhere, citing a further erosion of public trust and inevitable tax hikes if the construction industry remains stalled. 

To prevent what he claims is an economic exodus, Puopolo presented a detailed action plan to the committee, urging Council to decouple planning approvals from water allocation immediately.  

The proposed strategy includes a 30-day sprint to define a capital plan for the immediate refurbishment of the Mannheim system, bridge the gap by initiating a link between the Middleton and Mannheim water systems, and audit high-capacity users by meeting with the Region’s 50 largest water consumers to incentivize rapid reduction in usage before the August peak. 

However, the solution for the water capacity issue isn’t as simple as building more pipes and infrastructure. Alex Latta, associate professor in the Department of Global Studies and the Department of Geography and Environmental Studies at Wilfrid Laurier University, said that while ceasing development entirely is not the answer, the Region must re-evaluate its population targets.  

“We need to re-evaluate the scope of population growth that we have said we can accommodate in our region’s Official Plan,” they said. Huck also highlighted the “social” side of the capacity equation: conservation. While the Region has implemented odd-even lawn watering and low-flush toilet incentives, Huck said that further measures might begin impacting residents’ daily lives, raising the question of whether residents would support the further restrictions necessary to measurably increase the buffer between supply and demand. 

While a Great Lakes pipeline is often discussed as a solution for capacity issues, both Latta and Huck remain cautious. Latta said it would be a “last resort” due to extreme costs, urging the Region instead to adopt aggressive conservation measures and stricter regulation of commercial water permits. 

“One of Canadians’ deeply held myths is that we have boundless supplies of fresh water,” said Latta. “Starting to value and respect water is the first step to living in tune with the hydrological realities of our region.” 

Sam Nabi is WLUSP’s Web Manager. 

This article was cross published with The Cord.

REGIONAL COUNCIL AMENDS BY-LAW TO DEFER POSSESSION OF 100VIC

On Jan. 9, 2026,  the Region of Waterloo council amended By-Law 25-021. This deferred the possession date for the Kitchener transit hub site until Apr. 1, 2026. Metrolinx has advised the Region of Waterloo that it requires the use of 100 Victoria St. N. for its Kitchener Central Transit Hub (KCTH). The first version of the bylaw was designed to have encampment residents off 100Vic by the end of 2025.  The region wants to use the property as a staging area for construction vehicles and equipment for the KCTH, planned to be built at the nearby intersection of King St. and Victoria St. 

The amendment was made to allow residents of 100 Victoria St. N. encampment (100Vic) to find alternative housing options.    

“The offer would include an individual housing plan with appropriate alternative accommodation, social service supports and transportation and storage for up to six months at no cost to the person,” Fiona McCrea, regional solicitor and director of legal services, said.   

An information session for current residents of the 100Vic ran on Jan. 5, 2026, along with a public information and input meeting on Jan. 7, 2026. A summary of these two sessions was included in the appendix of the addendum report.   

“There was support expressed at both sessions for the removal of the monetary penalty and the provision of written offers of alternative accommodation included in the amendments,” McCrea said.   

Across the Waterloo Region, there are 24 known encampments and approximately 50-59 residents in them. However, the 100Vic by-law and its amendment would only affect the residents and the encampment there.  The motion of including a safe-tenting by-law came up on the Jan. 9, 2026, meeting. This would outline the procedures which people are to follow when putting up tents in designated areas deemed suitable by a governing body.   

“Such a protocol exists in other communities in Ontario including Hamilton, London, St. Thomas and the Region of Peel. These are provisions set through a by-law that provides the circumstances and conditions [in] which individuals can tent in the municipality,” Peter Sweeney, Commissioner of Community Services, said.  

Safe tenting by-laws come in one of two forms: one where individuals are given specific locations in which they are permitted to tent. The other outlines where people are not permitted to tent and sets provisions of distance from schools, cemeteries and childcare centers.   

For example, London’s Park and Recreation Area By-Law-PR-2 prohibits people from encroaching on municipally owned lands or erecting fences on municipally owned lands without the written consent of the City. Whereas the Region of Peel’s Encampment Policy Framework and Joint Protocols  explicitly outlines areas where encampments are prohibited. 

“Not one person that spoke last night wanted this amendment. Even though you [the council] might think it would be advantageous to those living in the encampment.” Pam Wolf, Region of Waterloo Councilor, said.  

Wolf wanted the Region of Waterloo council to explore the safe tenting protocols of other municipalities. The motion to explore the safe tenting protocol was defeated by a final vote of 8-8.