An ongoing review of Plan 2014 and the regulation of Lake Ontario outflows will be informed by a diverse Public Advisory Group of people from Canada and the United States.
Plan 2014
Plan 2014 is the plan for regulating Lake Ontario outflows that went into effect in 2017. In two of the first three years after the plan was adopted, extremely wet conditions caused record floods on Lake Ontario and the St. Lawrence River.
The International Joint Commission (IJC) recently received $1.5 million in funding from the United States, with an additional $1.5 million in matching funds from Canada, to investigate possible improvements that could be made to Lake Ontario outflow regulation activities.
Since the 2017 high water event and more recently in 2019, the International Joint Commission and its International Lake Ontario – St. Lawrence River Board (ILOSLRB) have heard, and seen first-hand the devastating impacts that extreme water level conditions have had.
Question 7. Why wasn’t more water released in 2018 when Lake Erie levels were high and downstream flooding wasn’t an issue?
Answer:
Wet conditions throughout the Great Lakes-St. Lawrence River basin in the spring of 2019 resulted in record or near-record high water levels this past summer on all of the Great Lakes.
When water supplies exceed capacity in the Lake Ontario-St. Lawrence River system, water levels rise. When this happens, regulation is looked to as the solution. But during periods of extreme water supply, the ability of regulated outflows to influence Lake Ontario levels is greatly diminished…