Dendrohydrological reconstructions of stream flow from the Snare River basin, NWT to inform management decisions concerning power generation

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Across the southern Northwest Territories, water levels and stream flows declined significantly in 2014 and 2015. These declines in flow impaired hydroelectric power generation across the region, especially in the Snare and Yellowknife river basins that supply electricity to the City of Yellowknife. The lost hydroelectric power generation led to substantial over expenditures of nearly $50 million by the Territorial Government to purchase diesel fuel to supplement the lost hydroelectric power generation. Planning for extreme low flows such as those during the past two years is difficult since instrumental climate records for this region only extend back in time to 1943. Records of stream flow and lake levels are equally short, and some records are very discontinuous. Therefore, it is difficult to determine the natural range of variability in these power generating systems using the short instrumental records of climate and hydrology. We propose to develop proxy data sources to extend