Last July, in what many of us thought to be the nick of time, painstaking negotiations between Canada and the United States produced a modernized, momentous agreement-in-principle to one of North America’s most consequential transboundary pacts.

The Columbia River Treaty, the framework for hydropower generation and flood control between the two countries, had been left untouched without an amendment since the 1990s – the only time it had been amended since its ratification three decades prior. Not surprisingly, both countries wanted changes.

With elections in both countries looming, negotiators resolved differences with the amendment so legislators could rubber-stamp the deal’s provisions for better water management, revenue sharing and Indigenous participation.

In principle, a great accomplishment. In practice, perhaps a wasted effort.

The treaty compensates Canada for storing water and British Columbia through the "Canadian Entitlement," granting a half-share of hydropower benefits generated in the U.S. from the presence of Canadian dams. Those benefits today total about US$200 million annually for the province.

But the treaty amendment languishes in limbo. It couldn’t be ratified by the U.S. Senate before last year’s........

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