The Waterloo Moraine is a

landform A landform is a natural or anthropogenic land feature on the solid surface of the Earth or other planetary body. Landforms together make up a given terrain, and their arrangement in the landscape is known as topography. Landforms include hills, ...

and

sediment Sediment is a naturally occurring material that is broken down by processes of weathering and erosion, and is subsequently transported by the action of wind, water, or ice or by the force of gravity acting on the particles. For example, sand an ...

body that was created as a

moraine A moraine is any accumulation of unconsolidated debris (regolith and rock), sometimes referred to as glacial till, that occurs in both currently and formerly glaciated regions, and that has been previously carried along by a glacier or ice shee ...

in the

Regional Municipality of Waterloo The Regional Municipality of Waterloo (Waterloo Region or Region of Waterloo) is a metropolitan area of Southern Ontario, Canada. It contains the cities of Cambridge, Kitchener and Waterloo (KWC or Tri-Cities), and the townships of North Dumfr ...

, in

Ontario Ontario ( ; ) is one of the thirteen provinces and territories of Canada.Ontario is located in the geographic eastern half of Canada, but it has historically and politically been considered to be part of Central Canada. Located in Central Ca ...

Canada Canada is a country in North America. Its ten provinces and three territories extend from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean and northward into the Arctic Ocean, covering over , making it the world's second-largest country by tot ...

. It covers a large portion of the cities of Waterloo and Kitchener and the township of

Wilmot Wilmot may refer to: Places Australia *Division of Wilmot, an abolished Australian Electoral Division in Tasmania * Wilmot, Tasmania, a locality in the North-West Region Canada *Wilmot, Nova Scotia, an unincorporated rural community and former t ...

, and some parts of the townships of Wellesley and

North Dumfries The Township of North Dumfries is a rural township in Ontario, Canada, part of the Regional Municipality of Waterloo. Communities North Dumfries includes the following communities: Ayr, Branchton, Clyde (formerly from Beverley Township, Wentwort ...

. About 90% of the water supply of the

is derived from

groundwater Groundwater is the water present beneath Earth's surface in rock and soil pore spaces and in the fractures of rock formations. About 30 percent of all readily available freshwater in the world is groundwater. A unit of rock or an unconsolidate ...

of the Waterloo Moraine

aquifer An aquifer is an underground layer of water-bearing, permeable rock, rock fractures, or unconsolidated materials (gravel, sand, or silt). Groundwater from aquifers can be extracted using a water well. Aquifers vary greatly in their characterist ...

system. During late 1989 and early 1990, groundwater contamination in Elmira forced the Region to shut down some well fields. As a result, new land use management guidelines and water protection measures have been enacted. The Waterloo Moraine is the largest of fourteen moraines in the Region, spanning approximately 400 square kilometres. It is an interlobate moraine, consisting primarily of

sand Sand is a granular material composed of finely divided mineral particles. Sand has various compositions but is defined by its grain size. Sand grains are smaller than gravel and coarser than silt. Sand can also refer to a textural class of s ...

and

gravel Gravel is a loose aggregation of rock fragments. Gravel occurs naturally throughout the world as a result of sedimentary and erosive geologic processes; it is also produced in large quantities commercially as crushed stone. Gravel is classifi ...

. It contains large aquifers, which discharge into the Grand River and its tributaries and maintain a base water flow rate into that system.

Origin

The Waterloo Moraine was formed as the three ice lobes of the

Laurentide Ice Sheet The Laurentide Ice Sheet was a massive sheet of ice that covered millions of square miles, including most of Canada and a large portion of the Northern United States, multiple times during the Quaternary glacial epochs, from 2.58 million years a ...

retreated across what is now Waterloo Region from

Lake Huron Lake Huron ( ) is one of the five Great Lakes of North America. Hydrology, Hydrologically, it comprises the easterly portion of Lake Michigan–Huron, having the same surface elevation as Lake Michigan, to which it is connected by the , Strait ...

in the west,

Georgian Bay Georgian Bay (french: Baie Georgienne) is a large bay of Lake Huron, in the Laurentia bioregion. It is located entirely within the borders of Ontario, Canada. The main body of the bay lies east of the Bruce Peninsula and Manitoulin Island. To ...

in the northeast,

Lake Ontario Lake Ontario is one of the five Great Lakes of North America. It is bounded on the north, west, and southwest by the Canadian province of Ontario, and on the south and east by the U.S. state of New York. The Canada–United States border sp ...

in the east and

Lake Erie Lake Erie ( "eerie") is the fourth largest lake by surface area of the five Great Lakes in North America and the eleventh-largest globally. It is the southernmost, shallowest, and smallest by volume of the Great Lakes and therefore also has t ...

in the southeast. As the glacier moved, it carried with it huge boulders, sand, gravel and debris. As the ice disappeared, the Waterloo Moraine remained, a huge complex of glacial sediments that is between 30 metres and more than 100 metres thick. Meltwater streams cascading from the surface of the ice lobes carried enormous deposits of sand and gravel and blocks of

bedrock In geology, bedrock is solid Rock (geology), rock that lies under loose material (regolith) within the crust (geology), crust of Earth or another terrestrial planet. Definition Bedrock is the solid rock that underlies looser surface mater ...

. The glacial sediments constituting the moraine rest upon the Guelph and Salina

carbonate A carbonate is a salt of carbonic acid (H2CO3), characterized by the presence of the carbonate ion, a polyatomic ion with the formula . The word ''carbonate'' may also refer to a carbonate ester, an organic compound containing the carbonate g ...

bedrock formations.

Significance

The Waterloo Moraine provides drinking water for over 300,000 people throughout Waterloo Region, and approximately 75% of its

potable water Drinking water is water that is used in drink or food preparation; potable water is water that is safe to be used as drinking water. The amount of drinking water required to maintain good health varies, and depends on physical activity level, ag ...

. The Waterloo Moraine is currently not protected by provincial legislation although there is an active movement from citizens to see that this takes place. Louisette Lanteigne and David Wellhauser of Waterloo have used the Environmental Bill of Rights to submit a Request for Review for a Waterloo Moraine Protection Act. This resulted in a 16-month review of source water and groundwater protection for the Waterloo Moraine. The findings were to be published in September 2008.

Function

In the vicinity where the three ice lobes began to retreat, sits the recharge areas that allow surface water to enter back into the ground source. The speed of absorption depends on the density of

s and

aquitard An aquifer is an underground layer of water-bearing, permeable rock, rock fractures, or unconsolidated materials (gravel, sand, or silt). Groundwater from aquifers can be extracted using a water well. Aquifers vary greatly in their characterist ...

s. Aquifers are made up of sand, gravel and silt where the water filters down relatively quickly. The shallow aquifers feed area bodies of water such as creeks and streams while the deeper aquifers feed down to replenish the ground water. The aquitards are the protective layers of clay that slowly filters the water and act to protect the main source from contamination. Left on its own, it is a naturally renewable way to gather fresh drinking water.

Ground water recharge

The moraine covers much of the City of Waterloo, Kitchener, Wellesley, Wilmot and North Dumfries, covering of land. Almost half of the ground water recharge takes place on only 15% of the Grand River watershed and 80% occurs on only 30% of the land mass most of which is located at the west end of Waterloo Region in the townships of Wilmot and Wellesley.

Threats

The ground water travels down from west to east feeding area wells throughout the region. Subdivision developments in the west end would create more impervious surfaces in the vicinity of the recharge area. Instead of allowing the water to refill the source, the run off will be diverted to sewage systems instead. This will mean a permanent decrease in the volume of water entering area wells. The reduction of water in the wells will significantly increase the parts per billion of contaminants in the system jeopardizing the quality of water in the aquifer and increasing the costs of filtration. If an increase in traffic follows the development in the vicinity of the aquifer, there will be an increased risk of contamination by road salt which is, according to Environment Canada, a known toxic substance. Road salt is a form of chloride that kills fish and pollutes area creeks and streams.

References

External links

Professor Alan Morgan speaks of the History of the Waterloo Moraine

Road Salt Danger to the Waterloo Moraine

* ttp://www.grandriver.ca/index/document.cfm?Sec=26&Sub1=30 Grand River Conservation Authority's Water Forum Review 2004{{coord, 43.432, N, 80.574, W, display=title Moraines of Ontario Landforms of the Regional Municipality of Waterloo