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  1. Drinking water plants in Canada supplied 5,103 million cubic metres of potable water in 2011, a reduction of 9% since 2007.
  2. Drinking water plants furnished potable water to nearly 29 million Canadians in 2011. The majority of those (just over 25 million people) received drinking water supplied by surface water sources, which accounted for 89% of the water withdrawn from the environment by drinking water plants.
  3. For plants reporting the percentage of water used by the residential sector, the average person used 251 litres per day at home in 2011.
  4. The residential sector used the largest share of drinking water in 2011, followed by the industrial, commercial, institutional and other non-residential sectors combined. Nationally, 18% of the total water volume produced could not be allocated to a particular sector.
  5. Capital expenditures on additions, expansions, or upgrades to drinking water plants totalled $1,336 million in 2011.
  6. In 2011, drinking water plants spent $882 million on operation and maintenance costs for the acquisition and treatment of potable water.
  7. Conventional plants and direct filtration plants produced 60% of the treated water in 2011, up 5% from 2007. The share of the total population served by these plants increased by 7% to just over 19 million people, or 66% of the population served.
  8. In untreated surface water sources used by drinking water plants, 22% of monthly E. coli maximum measurements were zero.
  9. The turbidity of untreated surface water sources was lower on the east and west coasts of Canada and higher in the interior. Turbidity, which naturally varies between watersheds, was highest in source surface water in the Assiniboine–Red, the North Saskatchewan, the Lower Saskatchewan–Nelson and the St. Lawrence drainage regions.
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