The Peace–Athabasca drainage region extends across 485,145 km2 of northern Alberta and British Columbia. Its landscape was dominated by natural and semi-natural areas (90.9%) in 2011, although there were significant amounts of arable land (6.2%) and natural land for pasture (2.3%).
The population was 406,303 in 2011, with a population density of 0.9 persons/km2.
Surface freshwater intake from manufacturing, mining, drinking water plants and thermal-electric production was 297.3 million m3 in 2013.
The average annual water yield was 99.5 km3 over the period 1971 to 2013. The water yield per unit area was 0.21 m3/m2, compared to 0.35 m3/m2 at the Canada level. Monthly water flows peak in June. Data on trends over time are not available.
Some sources of nitrogen and phosphorus residuals in the environment include fertilizer application, livestock and poultry production and the 155,828 tonnes of nitrogen-containing substances emitted to air, land and water by industrial facilities in 2014. These emissions accounted for 21% of direct industrial emissions across Canada.
