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Once again the federal and provincial
governments continue to rewrite the national environmental
standards to "better protect" the population in Sydney
Nova Scotia. Yet again, the federal Health Department has
created new Sydney specific "urban background" levels for
pollutants that ignore CCME health based standards.
Made in Sydney Standards
Sierra Club of Canada and the
People's Health Commission
March 8, 2002
Once
again the federal and provincial governments continue to
rewrite the national environmental standards to "better
protect" the population in Sydney Nova Scotia. Yet again, the
federal Health Department has created new Sydney specific
"urban background" levels for pollutants that ignore CCME
health based standards. These "new made for Sydney " urban
levels are six times higher than the CCME standards for
arsenic, 12 versus 72 mg / kg of soil. Even though78
additional properties exceed these "made for Sydney urban
background levels", the federal government states that no
action is necessary.
Elizabeth May, Executive Director
of the Sierra Club of Canada, is today demanding a release of
all data that led to the creation of the "made for Sydney
urban background levels". "The Sierra Club of Canada is
demanding that all the data that led to this perverse raising
yet again of permissible pollutant levels in Sydney be
released immediately. A full public review must be conducted
by independent experts immediately to stop the erosion, for
political purposes, of the health based standards set out by
the CCME."" If they get away with this erosion of these
federal standards to protect human health in Sydney, no
community in this country will be safe from these dangerous
site specific standards that victimize disempowered
communities by legally allowing people to live on unsafe
levels of soil pollutants like lead, arsenic and PAH (coal
tars).
Neila MacQueen who lives on Dorchester St. only
a hundred meters from the infamous tar ponds is outraged. "The
levels of arsenic in my yard are above the unacceptable "urban
background levels" and still they refuse to act or let me see
how they came to this ridiculous conclusion." " I have a
severely disabled child and I have had lung cancer despite
never having smoked in my life. How can they continue to deny
the impact of the pollutants on human health and continue to
be so cold and callous?" Neila wonders.
Sierra Club
Science Advisor, Daniel Green wonders where the constant
upping of permissible standards in Sydney will end. "It seems
every time Health Canada finds high contamination levels on a
property they change the standard to make what was
unacceptable yesterday acceptable today. This kind of "bargain
basement toxicology" is condemning people to be exposed to
higher and higher levels of toxic chemicals".
This
graph (below) shows the steady progression of the “made for
Sydney soil standards” for arsenic and lead used by the
federal and provincial governments to justify inaction in
dealing with the widespread contamination of soils found in
the neighboorhoods around Sydney’s hazardous wastes sites. As
it now stands, the urban reference or acceptable level for
arsenic in soils for Sydney is 72 mg of arsenic / kg of soil
(the yellow bar at the far right in the arsenic side of the
graph). This is 6 times the Canadian Council of Ministers of
the Environment (CCEM) guideline of 12 mg of arsenic / kg of
soil (the red bar at the far left of the graph). Arsenic is a
known human carcinogen.
For lead, the “made for Sydney
urban level” is more than two times the CCME level. Lead is a
potent neurotoxin and affects brain development and behavior
in children.
In Ontario, the reference values used are
just a little above (17 mg/kg for arsenic) or even below (98
mg/kg for lead) of the CCME guidelines. (The green or second
bar from the left in the graph)
It is important to
note the “urban reference” values for arsenic and lead have
increased from the values proposed just last fall (November
2001). The urban reference level for arsenic was 49 mg / kg
last fall, now it is 46 % higher at 72 mg / kg. For lead, the
value was 250 mg/kg in the fall, now it is 320, a 28 %
increase. (See the blue bars in the graph) The trend towards
higher and higher “acceptable contamination values “ for
Sydney goes against all common sense in protecting human
health and is in direct contradiction of established
principles of precaution and “doing no harm”.
www.sierraclub.ca
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