From the Rockies to the Prairies and the Arctic to the United States border, a $5 million investment will allow scientists to study Western Canada’s major river systems and how they are affected by climate change.

The Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada has announced seven environmental projects that will receive about $32 million in funding over five years through the Climate Change and Atmospheric Research initiative.

It includes $5 million for the Changing Cold Region Network, a major new initiative led by the Global Institute for Water Security at the University of Saskatchewan that also includes the school’s Centre for Hydrology, and links eight other Canadian universities, four government agencies and 15 international academics.

“It’s one of the biggest hydrological projects that Canada will have seen,” said Howard Wheater, the institute’s director and Canada excellence research chair in water security. “There are huge issues around rapid environmental change in Western Canada.”

The network will put together experts and experimental sites to study changes to the major river systems — including the Saskatchewan River Basin, which goes through Alberta, and the Peace-Athabasca-Mackenzie river systems in the northern part of the province.

John Pomeroy, a professor at the U of S who conducts research out of the Marmot Creek Research Basin in Kananaskis Country, said the federal funding will have a tremendous impact across the Prairies.

“It provides some good core funding for the next five years for myself and a number of other people who are working in the Rockies, from Kananaskis right up into the icefields,” he said. “We’ll be looking at the impact of snowpack and changing glaciers and changing forest cover — which are all shifting in response to the changing climate — on our water supply.”

Pomeroy, Canada research chair in water resources and climate change, said it’s important work because there have been declines in flow on the Bow River coming into Calgary in the late summer and higher flows in the winter.

“We are making greater use of this water for agriculture and our growing cities,” he said.

Similarly, the Athabasca River is the water supply for the oilsands in northern Alberta.

“It makes sense for Canada to be investing in this,” said Pomeroy, noting the research comes at a time when Canada needs to prove it’s developing the oilsands responsibly. “The more we understand about how the climate and water supply systems that we use to develop those oilsands and the streamflows on pipeline crossings — how all that works and how it is changing — the better job we can do in terms of acting responsibly.”

It’s also hoped it will lead to better information before extreme weather hits, such as last year’s rain-on-snow event in the Bow Valley that led to major flooding and caused millions of dollars in damages.

Other experts said it allows scientists to continue research that was unfunded after the cancellation of other programs.

“It fills the gap, at least temporarily,” said Robert Sandford, Canada’s representative for the United Nations Water for Life initiative. “Our hydrology is changing and, in order for us to be prosperous in the future, we have to know how those changes will trend and we have to know how to adapt them so we don’t end up with extensive disruptions to our economy and our agriculture as a result of those changes.”