Canada's Pulp and Paper Pollution Up for Investigation

MONTREAL, Quebec, Canada, October 27, 2003 (ENS) - The international agency responsible for monitoring Canada's environmental performance, the Commission for Environmental Cooperation (CEC), has recommended that a public investigation be launched into the lax enforcement of anti-pollution laws against Canada’s pulp and paper industry.

The investigation is the result of a complaint submitted to the CEC in 2002 by the Sierra Legal Defence Fund on behalf of national and local environmental groups from Ontario, Quebec, New Brunswick, Nova Scotia and Newfoundland and Labrador.

The submission alleges that Canada is failing to effectively enforce the pollution prevention provisions of the Fisheries Act and provisions of the Pulp and Paper Effluent Regulations (PPER) against pulp and paper mills in Quebec, Ontario and the Atlantic provinces.

The submitters documented over 2,400 alleged violations of the regulations at some 70 mills in central and eastern Canada from 1995 to 2000 and claim very few were prosecuted.

Most of the alleged violations involve the failure of mill effluent to meet limits on acute lethality, biochemical oxygen demand or total suspended solids or the failure to conduct the followup tests required when initial tests indicate that effluent is "acutely lethal," the CEC said.

The north end of the Tembec mill looking down on the Ottawa River to the left, and the town of Témiscaming in the distance (Photo by Doug Mackey courtesy Past Forward Heritage Limited)

“A full investigation is needed to determine why the federal government turned a blind eye to certain pulp and paper mills in central and eastern Canada and allowed them to violate federal laws with impunity for more than a decade,” Wright said.

In its response of August 2002 to the environmental groups' submission, the government of Canada described how federal Fisheries Act inspectors conduct investigations to determine if reasonable grounds exist for believing a pulp and paper mill has committed a Fisheries Act offense.

Canada provided detailed information regarding federal and provincial enforcement responses taken from 1995 to 2000 in regard to the four Atlantic provinces mills, six Quebec mills and two Ontario mills for which the submitters say they have particular concern.

But last week, the CEC Secretariat determined that Canada's response "leaves open central questions regarding whether Canada is failing to effectively enforce the pollution prevention provisions of the Fisheries Act and the PPER."

The secretariat asks for a full investigation into 12 mills of particular concern, including Tembec’s mill in Temiscaming, Quebec and the Irving mill in Saint John, New Brunswick.

Mill process water is aerated at the Irving Pulp Mill, Saint John, New Brunswick (Photo courtesy IFDN)

“A full investigation by the CEC will identify why the federal government failed to use all the available enforcement tools even though they were blatantly aware of the industry’s chronic violators,” said Beatrice Olivastri, chief executive officer of Friends of the Earth Canada.

“And if the feds are not prosecuting violations that are acutely lethal, then what else are they ignoring? asked Olivastri. "We want to shine a spotlight on these enforcement issues so that the federal government will more effectively and equitably enforce the regulation of this and other sources of pollution.”

The CEC was established under the North American Agreement on Environmental Cooperation, a side agreement to the North American Free Trade Agreement to address environmental issues in North America from a continental perspective, with a focus on those arising in the context of liberalized trade. The CEC Council, the organization's governing body, is composed of the top environment officials of Canada, Mexico and the United States.

The full text of the submission, Canada's response and the secretariat's factual record recommendation are available on the CEC website, at: http://www.cec.org/citizen