The Conflict Between Commerce and Human Health - CRD Residents Beware
As seen in other jurisdictions across Canada and in the U.S., agencies mandated to protect the health and safety of the environment and humans continue to prioritize commerce over human health.
There is growing concern that this is what staff and board of directors of the Capital Regional District on Vancouver Island (CRD) are doing with plans to spread toxic biosolid sewage waste rather than find a less risky solution (ship biosolids to operating bio-char plant or develop waste-to-energy technology, for example). A closer look at the sewage processing project and projected expansion proposed for the Hartland landfill raises the same concerns.
Why the growing concern?
Failure of CRD to engage in required meaningful consultation.
Evidence that the CRD is signing contracts for expansion while at the same time claiming they are in the initial planning proposal and consultation stages.
Last minute decision - (with a failure to consult) to reverse the CRD ban on land application of toxic biosolid waste.
Reversal of CRD’s biosolids ban and the renege of their promise to not spread sewage biosolids at Hartland or in the Capital Regional District.
Those raising their voices in concern - Mount Work Coalition, residents of Willis Point, Highlands, Prospect Lake, and Friends of Tod Creek Watershed, for example - have received only vague platitudes lacking details and real dialogue from CRD staffers, who then turn around and claim that consultation has occurred.
It appears that the CRD is motivated by several factors to make unwise and hasty decisions without consultation:
Convenience
Low Cost
Commerce
It appears the CRD is foregoing:
Required consultation with stakeholders and constituents
Long-term planning that takes climate change, the whole region and its safety into account
Public health
Protection of CRD lands, water, wildlife, its limited recreational areas and food security
Citizens are being fed a rhetoric of ruse:
The CRD claims that land application of biosolid waste is ‘beneficial’ and ‘temporary’ even though they recently banned the land application of biosolid waste due to it being deemed (with scientific evidence) toxic and posing health risks from the many persistent contaminants such as heavy metals that pose long-term negative impacts to the land, farms, food and water. It should be noted that there is no such thing as ‘temporary’ when it comes to plastics and heavy metals contamination.
Typical greenwashing regarding biosolids:
Biosolids are beneficial
Biosolids provide a good soil amendment
Biosolids are nutrient dense and make a good fertilizer
There is significant and growing evidence* from around the world that boisolid waste, including Class-A biosolids, are contaminated and pose health and environmental risks. (see sources at end of article)
The other ruse of the CRD is that they had to make this last-minute decision due to an unexpected deadline from the BC Ministry of Environment. However, George Heyman, Minister of Environment BC, publicly counters that the CRD had two years to come up with a plan for the excess biosolid waste at Hartland.
Obfuscation for the sake of convenience seems to be the tactic of the CRD:
Citizens are asking why the CRD won’t consider the more wise and less risky option readily available to them of safely shipping biosolid waste to a bio-char facility in Prince George which uses a high temperature thermal decomposition process to divert waste biomass, produce renewable heat energy and sequester carbon while producing a valuable natural soil-enhancement product (toxin-free) that can be used in the greenhouse.
*Photo credit: mojinoman/YouTube
*Sources: Health Canada, Environmental Protection Agency, EPA Office of Water, Environmental Working Group (esg.org), The Guardian, National Institutes of Health-US, NCBI, German Environment Agency
The National Center for Biotechnology Information (NCBI), a branch of the U.S. National Institute of Health, in their report titled: The case against land application of sewage sludge pathogens state: "Open field storage of sludge and sludge spreading near wells and surface water, increase the risk that sewage sludge pathogens will be transported to workers, farmers and neighbours, and increases the environmental risks of this waste disposal practice. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2094820/
Table 1. Harm to Human Health From 12 PFAS Chemicals EWG.org identified many studies showing the health impacts of PFAS, including harm to immune system, harm to development and reproduction, harm to endocrine system, metabolic changes, harm to liver enzymes, increased risk of cancer. https://www.ewg.org/news-and-analysis/2020/08/feeding-waste-cycle-how-pfas-disposal-perpetuates-contamination
Biosolid treatment increases PFAS concentrations. Feeding Waste Cycle: How PFAS disposal perpetuates contamination; EWG.org https://www.ewg.org/news-and-analysis/2020/08/feeding-waste-cycle-how-pfas-disposal-perpetuates-contamination " Heat treatment, commonly applied to sewage sludge to inactivate pathogenic organisms, increases measurable PFAS concentrations in biosolids.35" Note: the CRD’s Residuals Treatment Facility uses heat to create the biosolid waste.
Kim Lazcano, R., de Perre, C., Mashtare, M.L, and Lee, L.S. (2019)."Per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances in commercially available biosolid-based products: The effect of treatment processes. Water Environ Res 91(12): 1669-1677. https://doi.org/10.1002/wer.1174
Prions still present in class-a biosolids after anaerobic digestion: https://bit.ly/2GznGZJ Note: Prions cause Transmissible spongiform encephalopathies (TSEs) – which comprise a class of inevitably fatal neurodegenerative diseases afflicting a number of mammalian species including cattle (bovine spongiform encephalopathy [BSE] or “mad cow” disease), sheep and goats (scrapie), deer, elk and moose (chronic wasting disease [CWD]), ranched mink (transmissible mink encephalopathy [TME]), and humans (Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease, fatal familial insomnia, Gerstman-Stäussler-Scheinker disease, and kuru).
Risk of creating Superbugs after class-a anaerobic treatment – antibiotics persist: https://bit.ly/2GznGZJ Prevalence of Staphylococcus aureus infections among residents who lived near land application sites (biosolids). Approximately 25 percent of the individuals surveyed were infected, and two died. https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2002/07/020730075144.htm
Risk of contamination through air and water dispersal: Land application of toxic biosolids waste becomes airborne and disperses between 10km – 20km away, polluting farms, forests and water in surrounding areas. Toxins contained in biosolids shown to leach into the ground and disperse through groundwater run off.
USGS Toxic Substances Hydrology Program Studies findings: "The scientists confirmed that rainfall mobilized chemicals from municipal biosolids-amended agricultural fields directly to runoff. Most (14 of 17) of the chemicals examined were present in edge-of-the-field runoff and not depleted in concentration even after three simulated 100-year rainfall events." https://www.usgs.gov/mission-areas/environmental-health/science/commonly-used-chemicals-transported-agricultural-field?qt-science_center_objects=0#qt-science_center_objects
"A 2013 University of North Carolina study found 75% of people living near farms that spread biosolids experienced health issues like burning eyes, nausea, vomiting, boils, and rashes. A University of Georgia study found [those] living near [land applied biosolids] have contracted MRSA, a penicillin-resistant “superbug.” https://newsbeyonddetroit.net/2020/08/01/toilet-to-table-michigan-farmers-feed-crops-with-toxic-brew-of-human-and-industrial-waste/