After two hours of presentations and discussions the Muriel Lake Basin Management Society (MLBMS) voted to invest money into a long-term pressure monitoring system in wells around the depleting Muriel Lake.
The decision was made at the group's annual general meeting, which was held at the Bonnyville Centennial Centre last Sunday morning. Around 50 people showed up to the event that featured a presentation from hydrogeologist Alex Haluszka of Matrix Solutions Inc. Haluszka was hired by the society to conduct a study on the groundwater and surface water around Muriel Lake. His wife's family also has had property on the lake for decades, which is what got him interested in the project.
“My opinion is that the groundwater component of the Muriel Lake water balance has not been fully quantified. Creating some models of the area would be good but you want to have some good local data first before you start,” said Haluszka.
“I really believe that you need to start collecting some of this baseline data in the aquifers so you can make arguments against future operations and people withdrawing water from the aquifers.”
Lyall Kortzman, president of the MLBMS, also feels the group must collect local data and was fully supportive of the pressure monitoring system.
“I am almost certain this system will be helpful,” said Kortzman, who hopes the information collected can help shed some light on what is happening to Muriel Lake.
“Alex is a very clever individual and he has been leading us through this process. I am almost certain that we are going to get some answers as to what is happening to the groundwater in the region.”
For the past two decades, Kortzman and other property owners around the lake have been voicing their concerns about the lake's decreasing water levels.
Today, the lake is half it's original size, has no fish in it, no wildlife around it, no recreational activities on it and has properties strewn with “for sale” signs, as residents want out.
The deepest section of the lake is less than 15 feet deep, and that's only a small section. In the 1980's the lake deepest section measured over 30 feet deep, and was full of all types of fish. Today, the fish are all gone.
A few years ago a government crew came in and ran fine index netting through the lake, which was designed to catch every size of species living in the lake. They didn't find much.
“They ran index netting through the lake for four days and they only found stickleback minnows. That's it,” said Kortzman. “There are no fish in that lake.”
The most recent issue members of the MLBMS are dealing with is the temporary water license given to Baytex that allowed them to draw water out of the Muriel Lake aquifer.
Many members, including Kortzman, believe that the Baytex well could possibly be causing some of the troubles Muriel Lake is facing. The company, on the other hand, maintains it is not harming the struggling waterbody.
This is one question the system Haluszka will be implementing hopes to answer.
“In my mind there is no question that the pumping that they are doing will affect the amount of recharge that Muriel Lake will see. The difficult question to answers is how much effect is it having and is the effect important in the overall water balance,” said Haluszka. “Initiating this long-term pressure monitoring will start to allow us to look at some of the changes and trends in aquifer pressures and if any of them manifest from pumping you will have direct evidence to show that.”
Although Baytex and the MLBMS disagree with each other, they are still on talking terms and are having regular discussions. Several Baytex officials met with Kortzman in late June and came back down to give him and fellow member Jeff Hlewka a tour of their operation.
“I took them down to my shore level and I showed them where the water level was when I bought the property in 1983 and where the water level is now. It's gone done about 15 feet,” said Kortzman. “I also took them down and showed them the creek that is coming in from the northeast corner and I took them all the way up to Pengrowth.”
The two made it clear the MLBMS has no intention of trying to shut down the Baytex operation or impede its function in anyway. They said they just want some help to try and get to the bottom of what is causing the dwindling water levels at Muriel Lake.
“We are not here to stop the operations. We understand that people have families to feed and jobs to do. I think what we would like to do is get some usage from their political clout and get them to help us,” said Hlewka. “Once they get off and operating they stay in their own little world and they never communicate with the community. We would like to see some support, whether it be environmentally to help us clear some of those creek blockages or helping us act on some of the other things that have been identified as issues.”
Haluszka has already scouted out several wells around Muriel Lake, which he feels will be great to install the pressure monitoring equipment in. Now that he has been given the go-ahead from the society he will be getting the equipment from Matrix Solutions and installing it in the near future.
