Turning Lakes into Toxic Waste Dumps
Incredible what can happen when you’re not paying attention.
CBC News has learned that 16 Canadian lakes are slated to be officially but quietly "reclassified" as toxic dump sites for mines. The lakes include prime wilderness fishing lakes from B.C. to Newfoundland.
Environmentalists say the process amounts to a "hidden subsidy" to mining companies, allowing them to get around laws against the destruction of fish habitat.
Under the Fisheries Act, it's illegal to put harmful substances into fish-bearing waters. But, under a little-known subsection known as Schedule Two of the mining effluent regulations, federal bureaucrats can redefine lakes as "tailings impoundment areas."
I had been aware of at least one of these sites for some time, the “Sacred Headwaters” area of Northern BC. Here’s a brief description from the article:
In northern B.C., Imperial Metals plans to enclose a remote watershed valley to hold tailings from a gold and copper mine. The valley lies in what the native Tahltan people call the "Sacred Headwaters" of three major salmon rivers. It also serves as spawning grounds for the rainbow trout of Kluela Lake, which is downstream from the dump site.
Just the kind of place I’d pick for a toxic waste dump. As it turns out, the way I learned of this site wasn't in regards to a gold and copper mine, but Shell Canada's plans to drill for coalbed methane in the area. That plan was put on hold thanks to stubborn opposition by the local native population, but once the area is designated a toxic waste dump, you can be sure they'll be ready to go ahead with it.
It is also reminiscent of the battle over Sharbot Lake, where the mining company and the government are skirting the law to allow uranium exploration to take place near the headwaters for the Ottawa region.
As a result, I can't help but agree with the following.
A local environmentalist who attended the Long Harbour meeting, Chad Griffiths, said of Sandy Pond: “It's easy enough to consider just one lake as just one lake, as a needed sacrifice, right? But it's not one lake … It's a trend. It's an open season on Canadian water.”
So long as it is in isolated and remote areas, much like the tar sands developments in Northern Alberta, too few people are around to pay attention, and the government and industry can get away with driving dump trucks through the loopholes, but someday soon we will all regret allowing them to poison our watersheds.
