Ensuring water sustainability, regional prosperity, and livability
Water resources have strategic importance in achieving economic growth, competitiveness, and high quality of life. The Metropolitan Council’s
2040 Water Resources Policy Plan focuses on ensuring sustainable water resources in the region. The plan balances the demands of growth with the protection and management of our lakes, rivers, streams, wetlands, and groundwater.
We developed the plan in partnership with local communities, watershed management organizations, and other stakeholders. Policies and strategies focus on supporting outcomes identified in Thrive MSP 2040, the region’s overall development framework for the seven-county Twin Cities metro area. These outcomes include prosperity, livability, equity, sustainability, and stewardship.
The Met Council adopted the plan in 2015 and amended it in 2018 to incorporate additional wastewater reuse policies.
Integrating water planning
The overall theme of the Water Resources Policy Plan is to further integrate planning for wastewater, water supply, and surface water management. The challenges of water supply, water quality issues, and environmental stewardship need strategies that look at the whole water picture and consider how efforts in one area could benefit the other.
For example, an integrated approach sees treated wastewater effluent and stormwater as resources for irrigation and use in industrial processes. The plan includes policies and strategies to:
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Treat wastewater from municipalities and industries to high water-quality standards at affordable and fair rates
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Work with partners to preserve the quality and quantity of groundwater and surface water
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Better integrate our work in water supply, surface water, and wastewater
Water Resources Policy Plan documents
Other regional plans
The regional development guide, Thrive MSP 2040, sets the policy foundations for systems and policy plans developed by the Met Council. Other policy plans: