Okanagan Lake exceeds "full pool" 4 out of the last 5 years

[LANDM]

I'm with brentville.... Just keep the lake a little below "full pool" so that we have some buffer space should heavy rain and snowmelt cause a drastic, quick rising lake situation.

It's not like we lack water. We're also not watering grass 5 months of the year so we can "recoup" the lake level during periods of less use.

To put a bunch of restrictions and due process and international water rights, etc. infront of solving the issue shows how much people actually care to do the right thing.

It doesn’t work that way. At all. Unless you can magically restrict inflows to the lake during the spring. Which you cannot do. Water kind of melts unpredictably and flows down hill.

Jeez, one guy goes on a three year obsessive rantathon simply because he had one of thousands of foreshore improvement losses in 2017, a record year, and someone actually listens to him. How odd.

Also, brentville doesn’t know what full pool means.

[brentville]

It seems some here are having trouble 'thinking outside the box'...well I guess that just substantiates the axiom that half the population have a below average IQ..."magically restrict inflows"... lmao

I previously posted an alternate method that provides sufficient seasonal water for downstream users and eliminates the risk of flooding:

"One inexpensive alternative is as simple as it gets, eliminates 'flooding' and totally scraps the need for the Ministry to forecast 'Jack'. There is approx. a 5.2 meter drop between Okanagan and Skaha lakes so let gravity do the work. Set the Penticton dam flood gates to the natural lake level, which is 1.2 meters below "full pool", weld them there and throw away the key. Then install two x 1.2 meter pipes roughly 4 meters below Okanagan Lake 'full pool' and allow these to gravity feed water into the Penticton channel if it's needed. Control could be as simple and inexpensive as a butterfly valve in each pipe. If downstream users require more water then merely open a valve."

The above method does not require snow-pack readings, weather forecasts, river flow readings, Ouija boards, bloodhounds or throwing darts at a chart of previous inflows. The water comes into the lake and leaves just as it did before anyone started screwing with it. Does anyone here have the cojones to post about this suggested alternate method or are you posting in this thread just to get your 'jollies' by annoying everyone?

[Frisk]

"One inexpensive alternative is as simple as it gets, eliminates 'flooding' and totally scraps the need for the Ministry to forecast 'Jack'. There is approx. a 5.2 meter drop between Okanagan and Skaha lakes so let gravity do the work. Set the Penticton dam flood gates to the natural lake level, which is 1.2 meters below "full pool", weld them there and throw away the key. Then install two x 1.2 meter pipes roughly 4 meters below Okanagan Lake 'full pool' and allow these to gravity feed water into the Penticton channel if it's needed. Control could be as simple and inexpensive as a butterfly valve in each pipe. If downstream users require more water then merely open a valve."

The above method does not require snow-pack readings, weather forecasts, river flow readings, Ouija boards, bloodhounds or throwing darts at a chart of previous inflows. The water comes into the lake and leaves just as it did before anyone started screwing with it.

Evaporation off of okanagan lake during a hot summer can heavily exceed the inflow amounts, there's more to making sure we reach full pool each spring than just having enough water for down steam. If we were to implement the idea above, the shorelines of okanagan lake would probably look like this by early august.

[Glacier]

Just because you're a rich owner on the lake ...

Are you sure he's rich?

No, and I'm not sure he isn't ThinkThank either.

[Fancy]

I don't think it's a big secret who he is (not Thinktank) but my guess is his problem is the issue of dock damage. More and more people are having problems with the higher than normal lake levels at this time of year. It didn't use to be a yearly occurrence.

[Glacier]

I don't think it's a big secret who he is (not Thinktank) but my guess is his problem is the issue of dock damage. More and more people are having problems with the higher than normal lake levels at this time of year. It didn't use to be a yearly occurrence.

Are you sure about the high lake levels? What changed?

EDIT: here is the graph showing peak water levels on Okanagan Lake. Do you see a change? I don't.

[Sparki55]

Evaporation off of okanagan lake during a hot summer can heavily exceed the inflow amounts, there's more to making sure we reach full pool each spring than just having enough water for down steam. If we were to implement the idea above, the shorelines of okanagan lake would probably look like this by early august.

Evaporation from Okanagan lake can be approximated to July temperatures, revealing 1.8 million liters a day due to evaporation. On a very windy day, this can be increased in the right humidity conditions, but with our humidity level normally higher on stormy windy days, this normally isn't the case. The lake has a capacity of 24.6 trillion liters. The first 3 feet of the lake has a capacity of 320 million liters of water. The annual inflow to the lake is 400 million liters. Assume linear flow and that is 1 million liters a day flows into the lake.
In the winter, evaporation can become almost non-existent due to the the maximum saturation the ambient air can accept.

Anyway, zooming in on 2 months, in the summer, there is no way the lake can ever look like you pictured. We have too steep a dropoff, and even if the water evaporated at 5 million liters a day and no water flowed in, it would take 2 months to drain the lake 3 ft, from evaporation alone.

https://www.engineeringtoolbox.com/evaporation-water-surface-d_690.html

My point was, if "full pool" is 343m, move "full pool" to 342.5 meters? This isn't going to cause the lake to dry up, it will only adjust the level we manage it at. In drought years, it will be a little lower and in flood years it will be a little higher, but the average is shifted down slightly.

[brentville]

"Evaporation off of okanagan lake during a hot summer can heavily exceed the inflow amounts" Nice picture Frisk. lmao
As Spark55 put it, "there is no way the lake can ever look like you pictured." "it would take 2 months to drain the lake 3 ft, from evaporation alone."

Glacier, "No, and I'm not sure he isn't ThinkThank either." *bleep*? Does treatment here depend on who I am? You could be a schoolyard drug dealer for all I know, sittin' naked in your beanbag chair munchin' on Cheetos while you peck away at your keyboard...should that sway my opinion of your posts? NO. So, if you actually have something to contribute please do.

Fancy, "It didn't use to be a yearly occurrence." You're spot on there. As demand increases in the South, more water must be made available. Downstream water demand has dramatically increased over the past few years and current methods guarantee more frequent flooding....what may have worked 30 years ago isn't relevant anymore.

Nice graph Glacier but it doesn't show what you think it does. Since 2009 it clearly shows a dramatic increase in the average peak elevations.

Try this one that superimposes 2017 lake levels over 2018 levels with both starting on April 14th and at the same 2018 elevation of 1.206
One can clearly see that if the same 2018 start elevation was used in 2017 there would have been NO FLOODING!

(right click and open in new tab to see large image)

Reimer decided there was an impending 2017 drought, acted accordingly and set the April start elevation at a record high. Then when confronted with the flood damage, he told Global News that DFO told him to do it, "In early spring, Federal fisheries asked Reimer to wait to discharge more water from the dam until sockeye eggs hatched downstream near Oliver.", which of course was a deliberate lie to save his own azz. Yes, I have email proof of that too. Also, if anyone from DFO had ordered Reimer to do anything, the would have been fired (no authority to even suggest such an action).

I'd like everyone here to bring up anything you think is haywire with my alternate method. If you can't, then logically the Ministry should be forced to change their existing moronic methods.

[Glacier]

2017 had by far the wettest Spring on record. No one saw that coming.

BTW, I have one theory, and that is that society has been so saturated with climate change alarmism that they expect extreme drought every year, and keep water levels higher than they would otherwise.

[erinmac]

I started reading the OP, and started banging my head on my keyboard, so had to stop.

For the umpteenth time, the goal is to EXCEED "full pool" most years. Full pool is the target MINIMUM every year. If it's a dry spring, then they don't, but besides that, the level is reached. The reason for this is so there's enough water downstream if you have severe drought over the summer.

Just because you're a rich owner on the lake who was not bright enough to understand this, doesn't mean we should destroy millions of dollars in crops downriver so you can have an extra 10 feet of sand on your beach.

Someone shoot me.

How could the goal be to exceed “full pool”??? To intentionally flood the lake and all the crawl spaces of people that live on the lake? This makes no sense. Do you understand the damage it causes to not only docks, but homes when it rises even .10m past full pool? Obviously you have no grasp on this situation.

[brentville]

erinmac wrote:
How could the goal be to exceed “full pool”??? To intentionally flood the lake and all the crawl spaces of people that live on the lake? This makes no sense. Do you understand the damage it causes to not only docks, but homes when it rises even .10m past full pool? Obviously you have no grasp on this situation.

Absolutely erinmac!
2017 flooding eroded the rip-rap protection from many of my Neighbour's properties, A few weeks back, prior to reaching 'full pool', there was a moderate SE wind, no whitecaps, yet look what happened (pic). Any wave action during high water now circumvents the damaged rip-rap protection, erodes even more dirt and turns the lake into mud. This 'mudfest' likely kills all the hatchery fish too...as I haven't seen any over the last 3 years....usually there's thousands.

As all these properties get their drinking water from the lake and no amount of filtering works (clogs a filter in a few hours). We're all bathing in mud and buying bottled drinking/cooking water even though we pay to use the lake as a potable water source....nice huh?



The methods the Ministry use have failed 4 out of the last 5 years and an enema is in order.

[GordonH]

^^^ here’s an idea brentville take the government to court, oh right you planned to do that before. How did that go over or is it still ongoing.

added: if you need financial help I hear gofundme may work.

[brentville]

2017 had by far the wettest Spring on record. No one saw that coming.

BTW, I have one theory, and that is that society has been so saturated with climate change alarmism that they expect extreme drought every year, and keep water levels higher than they would otherwise.

Would it interest you to know that the same Engineer, 'Guy,' that authored both Provincial Reports on the 2017 flooding, which blamed it on 'Climate Change', had previously given several presentations to the Okanagan Basin Water Board on Drought Preparedness.

Reimer also made just such a presentation titled, "Drought Trigger Guidelines" on November 16, 2016:
https://www.obwb.ca/newsite/wp-content/uploads/3_SHAUN_OLRS-Management-Mainstem-Drought-Workshop-Nov-2016.pdf

Yes, just months prior to flooding Okanagan Lake in 2017, Reimer presented the OBWB the guidelines on handling droughts:



Take a good look at Guideline 1: Do not fill Okanagan Lake above 342.69 meters.

[brentville]

^^^ here’s an idea brentville take the government to court, oh right you planned to do that before. How did that go over or is it still ongoing.

added: if you need financial help I hear gofundme may work.

You're as helpful as ever. 25508 posts and not one worth reading.
Instead of your usual rhetorical garbage, lets test your IQ.
Tell us all the problems you see with the alternate method I suggested.
It's my idea so it must be garbage...put on that pointy hat and blow some holes in it.

[Frisk]

[
Evaporation from Okanagan lake can be approximated to July temperatures, revealing 1.8 million liters a day due to evaporation. On a very windy day, this can be increased in the right humidity conditions, but with our humidity level normally higher on stormy windy days, this normally isn't the case. The lake has a capacity of 24.6 trillion liters. The first 3 feet of the lake has a capacity of 320 million liters of water. The annual inflow to the lake is 400 million liters. Assume linear flow and that is 1 million liters a day flows into the lake.
In the winter, evaporation can become almost non-existent due to the the maximum saturation the ambient air can accept.

Sorry I meant to say evaporation and outflows, not just evaporation. Personally I don't think it would be the end of the world if they lowered the full pool level a foot or so but perhaps there's a reason? I'm not fully aware of the environmental or downstream effects that a lower level could have.