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EDMONTON VOLUME SIXTEEN NUMBER ONE SUMMER 1993
E N V I RON M E N T
S
I
W
Lifeboats
to the Future
Alberta's Ark: What's Wanted on the Voyage? • Scandanavian
Design for Calgary Living • Take the Test • Technology:
^ekyll or Hyde? • Inching Along: Measuring v
Sustainable Development
ENVIRONMENT
Lifeboats
How to Build
Special Places 2000
3 by Susan Kelly
Alberta's Ark
VIEWS
The Push to
Calgary's Affordable
Launch a New Sustainable Community
9
Way of Life Project by Scott Rollans
Environment Views is published quarterly by Alberta
How Well Do You Environmental Protection. Each issue deals with a
Find Your Spot specific topic from various viewpoints w ith the aim of
Know Your Way Around increasing awareness of environmental issues among
on the Lifeboat 12 Environmental Issues? Albenans. Environment Mews is directed by an
independent board with representation from
environmental groups, government and industry . T he
viewsexpressed by the publication are not necessarily
Can Technology The Technological Fix those of Alberta Environmental Protection.
Bail Us Out? 15 by Alice Major Subscriptions are free and can be obtained by
mailing the card on the back cover.
Permission to reproduce any part of this publication
forcommercial purposes should be obtained by w riling
the address below. Reproduction for other purposes
Charting a Course
19 Indicators should credit this publication.
for Sustainable
Letters to the editor are welcomed, and should be
by Debby Waldman
sent to:
Development Environment Views
Alberta Environmental Protection
Communications Division
Main Floor. Oxbridge Place 9820 - 106 Street
Edmonton. Alberta T5K 2J6
427-6267
Articles appearing in this magazine are indexed in
Environmental Periodicals Bibliography.
EDITOR'S NOTEBOOK
Editor: Lynn Zwicky. Rollans Laing
Communications Inc.
A plliafceeb oa otf cdaann g etra ke t o y oa u p lfarcoem o fa values p heers msayb weed d neede d i nc l etaerc h tnhoilnokgiyn g b aebfoourte twhee DAesssiisgtnaenrt: EGdriatnotr : E lBsatronb,a r aS i lMiccoCno rTdy pe
safety. This issue of Environ- can expect technology to solve our environ- & Graphics Ltd.
ment Views tells the stories of mental problems. Alice Major, in her story on Editorial Board: Ian Burn, executive director.
people in Alberta who are trying to move us the technological fix, explores our hopes and Energy Efficiency and Environmental
away from environmental crisis and toward fears about relying on technology to bring Affairs Branches, Alberta Department of
a more environmentally secure world. environmental crises under control. WEnielrdgeyr;n e Dsasv i dS o cDioedtgey,; CAarnlaedniea n K wPaarsknsi a akn.d
The Alberta Round Table and other groups Environmental Law Centre. Edmonton:
Susan Kelly's article on Special Places Peter Lee, head. Natural and Protected
2000 describes an Alberta government pro- in Canada have taken on the challenge of
Areas, Alberta Environmental Protection:
posal to p rotect our wild lands. If the proposal identifying sustainable development indica- David McCoy, senior environmental
succeeds, it will preserve for the future a scientist. Husky Oil. Calgary: Fred
tors. It's tough going. They are trying to
package of intact ecosystems: an ark. measure progress toward something we still McDougall. vice-president and general
manager, Weyerhauser Canada Ltd.:
Sustainable communities will also be gifts
don't know the shape of: sustainable devel- Trevor McFadyen. student. University of
to future generations. They will be created to opment. Should we stop and study more, or Alberta; Charlotte Moran. assistant director of
fit into a world with more people and fewer muddle on and learn as we go? Debby communications. Alberta Environmental
Waldman covers this emerging field. Protection: Kim Sanderson. Canadian Society
resources. But that's not their only attraction. of Environmental Biologists; Annette Trimbee.
When Scott Rollans talked with people about This issue also marks a passage from a
manager. Environmental Assessment Section.
place of safety to a place of danger. After 1 1 Alberta Environmental Protection; Bob
Calgary's Affordable Sustainable Commu-
nity Project, they told him they liked the years in the steady and capable hands of Westbury. vice-president of Environment and
Public Affairs. TransAlta Utilities Corporation,
community design because it w ould let them Maryhelen Vicars, Environment Views has a
Special thanks to Archie Landals for his help
meet their neighbours. A solid sense of com- new editor. We'll miss Maryhelen and her with this issue.
Printed on recycled paper.
munity rivals things such as energy-efficient dedication to making Environment Views an
housing and co-operative composting as key important magazine. If I r ock the boat in my
ingredients in a sustainable neighbourhood. new role, I hope I also manage to keep it o
Technologists think up new ways to clean afloat.
up old environmental problems and avoid
Lynn Zwicky is an Edmonton writer
new ones. Their innovations will no doubt be and researcher who specializes in
ydlbcrra
environmental issues.
important as the next generation tries to do
ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION
more with less. But environmental philoso- Cover photo: Mark Degner
UNIVERS-In/T Y o r L IABLRBAERRYT A Environment Views Summer 1993
Susan Kelly
SPECIAL PLACES 2000
How to Build Alberta's Ark
Boreal forest near Athabasca.
Timber leases claim over
Thew hate x pweer ts s h hoauvled hparde s etrhevier osfa y A labbeoru-t
200,000 square kilometres of Alberta's boreal
turn. ta's wild lands. Soon it w ill be your forest. A protected areas system will lock some of it away
Special Places 2000 is a government pro- for good. Chris Anderson, director of forestry with Canfor in
posal to p rotect Alberta's natural diversity for says the systematic approach of Special
future generations. The objective is a com-
pleted parks system by the end of the decade
and the policy outlines a strategy for piecing UWVERSITY OF ALgt%<j%s 2(>00 will make it easier for
it together. It divides the province into 19 fOMO/VTO/V, ALBERTA industrv to set areas aside-
natural regions and sets targets for the amount CANAQA
of land to be protected in each.
Special Places 2000 for the past year. "We
The planners who drafted the proposal are want support from the public and from the
The proposal appears to have political sup-
now looking for approval to put it i nto action. politicians to complete the system by 2000, port. At the end of April, the government
Archie Landals is a systems planner with the and to say, 'yes, the framework of the natural atphpeo i snytsetde m .a' "p anel to collect public comment
Alberta Parks Service who has worked on regions is a good thing to guide completion of on Special Places 2000. The report of the
Summer 1993 Environment Views 3
five-member panel, chaired by former envi-
ronment minister Fred Bradley, is due the end
of June.
"It's like a wind change," says George
Newton, advocacy chair for the Canadian
Parks and Wilderness Society (CPAWS). "For
20 years we've been fighting to get protection
for wilderness, and have actually lost wilder-
ness protection in Alberta. That people in
high positions are actually seeing that we
have to do something and making that kind of
commitment I t hink is significant, because it
signals a change in the upper echelon, where
it's been so hard."
Special Places 2000, and projects such as
the World Wildlife Fund's Endangered Spaces
Campaign, are the direct descendants of the
Cliff Wallis, above;
and Archie Landals, below.
Special Places 2000
is a blueprint that shows what we of protection. The proposal's foundation is a
hierarchy of six natural regions. 1 9 subregions
need to protect.
and three levels of "natural history themes,"
which are local areas delineated with increas-
- Cliff Wallis
ing precision according to their natural fea-
tures.
The team doing the groundwork for the
World Commission on Environment and De- work of p rotected areas that meet four goals:
project has evaluated all of Alberta's existing
velopment, or t he Brundtland Commission. • to protect the full range of natural environ- protected areas, with the exception of sites
The Brundtland report, Our Common Future, mental diversity in Alberta, with virtually no protection value such as
recommended that countries protect 12 per • to protect natural landscapes for outdoor picnic grounds next to highways.
cent of their land mass in a natural state for recreation,
"That's the first time we have totally evalu-
the benefit of future generations. The reason • to provide the public with access to, and
ated everything," says Landals. "For the first
is that wild lands are irreplaceable. Once interpretation of, natural landscapes,
time, we know what's in the system." This
• to protect areas for adventure travel and data-intensive approach should lead to a pro-
they're gone, they're gone —
along with genetic resources ecotourism. tected areas system that truly represents Al-
of unknown potential and a The diversity protection goal has a
berta's diversity, rather than just a collection
piece of our spiritual home. clear target — 100 per cent representa- of unique sites.
If Special Places 2000 is tion of A lberta's diversity. No bench- "We're getting to a much more efficient
successful, by the end of the mark exists for the heritage, recreation way of handling the data and knowing what
decade Alberta will have a and tourism goals.
the options are than ever before," says Landals.
comprehensive net- "We really don't know what the tourism "We might get to the point where we can say:
and recreation targets should be," this is what we've got, this is what we're
Landals says. He hopes that public- missing and these are the options to fill them."
input will help set these targets. Maps of the natural regions and subregions.
George Newton of CPAWS in one form or another, have been around for
a decade or more. But they have never been
kesthe proposal's broad scope.
the foundation of a government policy on
"It goes beyond Endangered
protected areas. Cliff Wallis of the Alberta
Spaces." Newton says Endan-
gered Spaces is m ostly about Wilderness Association says Special Places
2000 is a big improvement.
preserving threatened eco-
systems, but Special "With this document, we have a blueprint
Places 2000 looks at
or a map to follow, to say 'OK. what don't we
outdoor recreation and
have enough of?" Our biggest problem all
heritage appreciation as along has been that there has been no stated
well.
government policy to get full representation
Special Places 2000 for the natural diversity that's out there in
is a systematic ap- Alberta. At least this gets us thinking about
proach to t he problem
things in an organized fashion."
Environment Views Summer 1993
Level of Existing Protection for Alberta's Natural Areas
s| L ittle or No Protection
J So me Protection
wyyh Moderate Protection
Good Protection
Natural Regions
and Sub-Regions
of Alberta
Grassland Natural Region
1 - Mixedgrass
2 - Northern Fescue
3 - Foothills Fescue
Parkland Natural Region
4 - Parkland
5 - Foothills Parkland
6 - Peace River Parkland
Foothills Natural Region
7 - Lower Foothills
8 - Upper Foothills
Rocky Mountain Natural Region
9 - Montane
10 - Subalpine
11 - Alpine
Boreal Forest Natural Region
12 - Dry Mixedwood
13 - Central Mixedwood
14 - Wetland Mixedwood
15 - Boreal Highlands
16 - Peace River Lowlands
17 - Subarctic
Canadian Shield Natural Region
18 - Athabasca Plain
19 - Kazan Upland
Summer 1993 Environment Views 5
then continue to work on the tough ones
The proposal's systematic approach also
appeals to industry. It will focus attention on poiAnntd e orfs ovnie w .s"a ys industry supports the con- where there are conflicts as we go along,"
the areas that are not well represented and cept behind Special Places 2000, but won- says Archie Landals. "The further you go, of
show, as a package, what needs to be set ders how the program will look on the ground.
course, the tougher it's going to be. But I s ee
aside. He anticipates conflicts in local areas. The
lots of opportunities for win-wins out there."
Special Places 2000 creates targets for the
"Industry thrives on predictability." says planners say they will pick their sites care-
Chris Anderson, director of forestry for amount of land needed to represent ecosys-
fully. "We'll focus on the easy wins first, and
Cantor. "If that kind of approach could be
established, if reasonable numbers could be
agreed on, if we could get it to a situation
Special Places 2000
where it's predictable and we know the rules,
that would be desirable from a broad industry targets 360 square kilometres of
the Kazan Uplands for protection. No legislation
now protects this remote, undeveloped piece of
the Canadian Shield in Alberta's
northeastern corner.
terns in each of its regions. For example, 250
square kilometres of organic wetlands would
adequately protect the Peace River Lowlands.
* u p Since over 6,000 square kilometres are al-
ready protected in Wood Buffalo National
1 1 . *m Park, the target has been reached and ex-
r ceeded. The picture is not as rosy every-
where. Overall, the system is about 50 per
cent complete.
30W mm Can we get the other 50 per cent together by
the end of the decade? Public review of the
proposal will make things slow, and as it
stands, it t akes about two years to designate a
new ecological reserve.
"I'd like to be optimistic," says Dave
Chabillon, assistant deputy minister. Alberta
Parks Service. "It does take time to get the
land base legislated but land can be identified
and placed under protective reservation until
the full public review and considerations are
given. So in my judgment, the year 2000 is an
attPariontaebclet e dg o aalr.e"a s are only the core of the
system and planners caution that they do not
adequately address the requirements of large
carnivores and migratory birds. Ideally, "zones
of protection" would surround the core areas,
where some development might be permit-
ted, but some land use controls would still
apply.
"To achieve your protection targets, you
are going to have to look at managing the
entire landscape," says Cliff Wallis. "These
target areas are the safety cores. The last thing
that we want is for these things to become
islands in a sea of total obliteration."
In addition, the targets only cover the pro-
tection goal o f Special Places 2000. Add in
Kazan Uplands at Wylie Lake. land for recreation and tourism and the sites
6 Environment Views Summer 1993
The Peace River Parkland Peace River Parkland at Silver Valley,
northwest of Spirit River.
now has 31 square kilometres of protected area,
a fraction of the 200 square kilometres needed to preserve it. have the capability of having parks, recrea-
tion areas, natural areas and ecological re-
Only remnants remain unploughed.
serves, plus t he capability of classifying be-
yond that written into the act." says Landals.
"You have more than enough categories to
would probably have to be larger. tem has grown over 60-odd years, and you
Special Places 2000 defines protected ar- used whatever legislation was expedient at
eas as " places that are explicitly legislated the time. So we've got areas out there that are
and managed to protect important natural
called provincial parks that by anybody's
features." Alberta has a variety of legislation definition are not; they're purely highway
for protecting natural areas, ranging from the
waysides or recreation areas." Special Places
Willmore Wilderness Act to the conditions 2000 proposes to review the classification of
for setting up ecological reserves. existing protected areas, which may help to
With 20 years of experience as a parks
clarify exactly what "protected" means.
system planner, Archie Landals has a clear Wallis and Landals agree that Alberta al-
ready has the legislation to achieve the goals
perspective on the status quo. "Quite frankly,
classification in Alberta is a mess. The sys- of Special Places 2000. "In the legislation we
People in high positions are
actually seeing that we have to do something
and are making a commitment.
- George Newton
Dave Chabillon
Summer 1993 Environment Views 7
The planners would like commitment from It's an idea that makes sense. Protected
work with, but everything that's out there
areas are supposed to benefit Albertans now
isn't necessarily in the right place. We have to outside government as well. "We would like
clean up what went before, but we're cer- to go back to environmental groups and cor- and in the future, and along with the right to
tainly not proposing any new legislation to porate Alberta and look for support in manag- have a natural heritage should go the respon-
sibility tot ake an interest in managing it.
get on with the job." ing these sites," says Dave Chabillon. "We
would be looking at the stewardship program
Cliff Wallis says legislation is fine, "but if Editor' s note: For a copy o/Special Places
that is already in place for the natural areas
the government commitment isn't there to 2000. and information on the public consul-
actually protect these areas and manage them and expanding it t o other protected areas. We
tation process, call 1-800-661-5586.
as intact systems, then no amount of legisla- see an opportunity for Albertans to be active
Susan Kelly is an Edmonton freelance writer.
tion is g oing to prevent their destruction." in managing the sites through volunteerism."
Big pieces of Alberta's
grasslands survive relatively intact —
grazed, but uncultivated. Private owners lay claim to
most of this land. Their co-operation will be
crucial in setting areas aside.
Grasslands National Park, Saskatchewan.
mon law allows property owners to re- which allows private people to enter into a
strict the u ses of their land even after they contract with the Minister of Natural Re-
Simply Setting sell it, t he intent has traditionally been to sources or a conservation group to protect
stop certain kinds of development. To stop
It A side natural areas they own. "The idea is to
all development and protect a natural area, have the preservation of an area enforced
you have to meet a set of cumbersome
by someone else," says Kwasniak. Prince
conditions. Edward Island has similar conservation
Albertlooaki nga n da t o twhaeyr s p rtoov i snicmepsl i afrye Says Kwasniak: "For example, you need easement legislation, as do most of the
privately setting aside land for two parcels of land — one that benefits states in the U.S.
conservation, says Arlene from the restrictions and one that is re- Kwasniak is encouraged by the interest
Kwasniak, a lawyer with Edmonton's En- stricted. Landowners who want to pre- the Alberta government has shown in
vironmental Law Centre. serve ba it of natural habitat usually do not
simplfying private conservancy. She thinks
Last year, Kwasniak helped Kathy and people who want to set aside land deserve
Locke Girvan place restrictive covenants worAsk wienl l p,a i Krws.a"s niak points out, common- all the help they can get. They already risk
on their lakeshore property to preserve it law covenants "must be framed in nega- losing financially by disallowing develop-
in perpetuity (see Environment Views ment.
tives— what you can't do — rather than in
15(4), Spring 1993, p.4). positives. It would be easier if we could
"They may take a beating, but they want
"It was very complicated," she says. say 'we want to keep this land for natural to do something to conserve nature."
"It's always complicated when you have habitat' instead of listing all the things it Lynn Zwicky
to use common-law rules." can't be to stay in a natural state."
Common law is a body of non-statutory Nova Scotia has the Conservation
rules built up by tradition. Although com- Easements Act, in effect since last year,
8 Environment Views Summer 1993
