Reimagining Wastewater Management through Ecological Intergration in Inverness, Nova Scotia

Abstract

Multi-use, ecologically integrated design of urban civic infrastructure
is necessary to meet the environmental demands of the future.
Climate-compromised and overloaded wastewater infrastructure
is an increasing concern in communities, causing disruptions to
service, and detrimental impacts of population and environmental
health. Water and wastewater infrastructure are essential to human
settlements; without them cities and towns are uninhabitable. Yet
the vital importance of these treatment plants is often unseen
and under-appreciated despite their often-central location to
watercourses and the communities they serve. The sites of these
plants therefore hold significant potential to become a civic asset to
the community.
This paper will present a case study of the wastewater treatment plant
of Inverness, Nova Scotia, Canada. Located between a world renowned golf course and a tourist beach, the aging treatment plant is
failing, producing odor and noise throughout the town. In recent years,
the town has gained provincial support to build a new treatment plant,
but this initiative has been narrowly conceived as an engineering
solution to meet minimum standards. The incorporation of ecology
into design parameters to create multi-use integrated architecture
is increasingly considered a baseline for such civic infrastructure
— especially in an era of climate change. This paper argues that by
integrating both ecological and civic considerations in the design of
wastewater treatment plants there would be far greater benefits to
community well-being, landscape identity, and ecological health.