Calgary's drinking water infrastructure faces billions in upgrades, high risks remain

Calgary's drinking water, wastewater, and stormwater systems face billions in infrastructure work needed by 2035, city infrastructure officials told council Wednesday, with several high-consequence water lines remaining vulnerable until assessment and redundancy improvements are complete.

The Infrastructure and Planning Committee received an asset management update stemming from recommendations made after the Bearspaw South feeder main failure in 2014. That panel's independent review concluded in June that "the absence of current, actionable Asset Management Plans was one of the most direct causes" of the failure. The city was asked to provide a 90-day progress update on fixing those gaps.

The city has now completed two of seven wastewater asset management plans and is implementing both. For stormwater, three of five plans are issued and in use. However, a critical drinking water asset management plan for Glenmore Reservoir remains outstanding, with the remaining plans expected by spring 2027. Ryan Vanderputten, director of capital planning and business services, told council that "aside from the Bearspaw South feeder main, there are other potential single points of failure that are high consequence of failure, but low likelihood."

Vanderputten said the city's approach has shifted: "In the past, we've accepted that there are low likelihoods. We've focused on other things. We're now making sure that we've got, whether it's redundancy, whether it's mitigation plans, or whether it's an emergency response plan, we're making sure all those are in place for that consequence because we've seen the impact that it has on our community."

For wastewater, several extensive and high-risk situations will remain for an extended period, limited by the city's capacity to take pipes offline for assessment or renewal. Near-term funding has been deemed adequate; the pace of work will depend on how quickly infrastructure can be isolated and replaced. Risk understanding is based on pipe age, material composition, and consequence estimates, with those assessments improving as ongoing work progresses.

As HOC covered in early October, Calgary's Executive Committee voted to approve potential rate increases to fund the $6.5 billion infrastructure upgrade package. Ward 2 Councillor Jennifer Wyness objected, saying the city has "changed their risk registry, and are now keeping us in this, like, state of crisis," arguing other water utilities take more measured approaches to addressing similar failures.