Sludge Watch ==> Toronto's gooey sludge to go to New York Landfill - Quebec composters

[maureen.reilly at sympatico.ca]

Sludgewatch Admin

Toronto is still in an expensive scramble to try to find destinations to 
take its sludge.  Having failed to complete its environmental assessment of 
the Ashbridges Bay sewage treatment plant (the largest in Canada) after 15 
years - and having failed to complete the smaller less onerous environmental 
assessment of its sewage sludge program - the city never really did the 
heavy lifting needed to characterize its sludge qualities and determine the 
environmental impacts of its various sludge diposal options.

So ... hundreds of millions of dollars later Toronto's sludge management 
program consists of some leased trucks that don't know where to take the 
stuff.

One curious feature of these stories is that the city said it has 20 trucks 
of sludge per day...but now tells reporters it has 15 and now 14 trucks of 
sludge per day. What's up with that?

Toronto gave all its sludge to American Water (operating as 'Terratec').  
Since farmers don't seem to want Toronto sewage sludge, Terratec arranged to 
take 90-98 % of the sludge into the Carleton Farms landfill - owned by 
Republic Services.  You see..then Toronto could continue in the fiction that 
Toronto has a 100% beneficial use program for its sludge..

But then it isn't just Toronto sludge that was going to the Michigan 
landfill. According to court documents Hamilton, Halton, Niagara, Owen Sound 
and Windsor sludges were also sent down there.
Ontario farmers are holding a province-wide boycott of sewage sludge 
spreading...but the agricultural use of sludge in Ontario has been limited.  
There are many reasons - post Walkerton there is a huge awareness of the 
risks of drinking contaminated water, the contents of the sludge is 
uncertain due to the limited testing protocols, the sludge stinks and 
bothers the neighbors, the farm is forever designated as having received 
waste which may limit resale value, and there is lots of manure available in 
Southern Ontario.



Want to know more about Terratec and American Water?:
http://www.polarisinstitute.org/polaris_project/water_lords/corp_profiles/corp_profile_rwe.html

And if you want a giggle...look at the spin on the American Water webpages 
on the success of the land application program and the storage facility for 
Toronto sludge.  That storage facility in Halton was an open air pit that 
overflowed with the stored sewage and spawned lawsuits by the neighbors.  
The pit was eventually emptied and now Toronto has no sludge storage site.

http://www.amwater.com/awpr1/commercial_services/residuals_service/case_studies/page3087.html

Did Toronto know how stinky its sludge is?  Heck yeah.  According to these 
Halton minutes..Toronto spent at least a quarter of a million dollars on a 
biosolids odour report.
Funny thing...that report doesn't seem to be something the city wants to 
allow the public to read.
No copies in the library.  When taxpayers spend that much money on a 
report..don't you think we should be allowed to read a copy?

http://councilarchive.region.halton.on.ca/cdm/cdm/rppp/rp2000/agpp1000/ppw7500.pdf

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www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/LAC.20060729.SLUDGE29/TPStory/TPNational/Ontario/

POSTED ON 29/07/06

Toronto Ontario
Globe and Mail
City inks two deals to ease crisis over sludge deadline
JEFF GRAY

Toronto may be close to solving its crisis over where to ship its sewage 
sludge, city council's works committee chairwoman said, after two deals to 
send some of it to compost plants in Quebec were announced yesterday.

The city has until Aug. 1 to come up with somewhere to ship the 
approximately 150,000 tonnes of sewage sludge it produces annually.

Republic Services, which owns the controversial Michigan landfill where 
Toronto sends its garbage, said it would no longer accept the city's 
biosolids.

Yesterday, works chairwoman Shelley Carroll confirmed that two companies, 
Burlington-based Environmental Management Solutions Inc. (EMS), and 
Ferti-Val of Bromptonville, Que., would together take 70,000 tonnes of 
Toronto's sludge over the next year.


The EMS contract is worth at least $13.5-million over three years, covers 
50,000 tonnes in the first year and 35,000 tonnes each year after that, and 
includes the cost of hauling the sludge.

The Ferti-Val deal is worth $1.1-million and covers 20,000 tonnes for one 
year.

Both firms plan to process the sludge at plants that make compost in Quebec.

Both deals include options for future years.

The city remains in talks with several other companies, Ms. Carroll said, 
with the possibility that more deals could be announced by Monday.

Meanwhile, city lawyers will be back in Ontario Superior Court next 
Wednesday seeking an injunction to force Republic Services to continue 
accepting the city's sludge.

Councillor Case Ootes (Toronto-Danforth) said the confusion, so close to the 
deadline, shows that Mayor David Miller's administration doesn't know what 
it is doing.

"This is just another example of a lack of strategic thinking on this 
issue," said Mr. Ootes, a right-leaning critic of the mayor.

"We've known [about this problem] since May. There is no excuse."

In May, citing an environmental order from the state of Michigan, Republic 
served notice it would not take sludge from any cities, including Toronto, 
after Aug. 1.

Since then, city officials have been scrambling to find new locations for 
the 11 to 15 trucks of sludge that Toronto produces every day.
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Canada.com

Que. firm takes gooey sludge from Toronto as city faces landfill deadline 
Matthew Chung, Canadian Press
Published: Saturday, July 29, 2006 Article tools
Printer friendly
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   Font: * * * * TORONTO (CP) - Canada's largest city came one step closer 
Friday to solving the dilemma of what to do with its treated sewage sludge 
by signing a three-year, $13.5-million deal with a Quebec composting 
company.

Environmental Management Solutions Inc. will take 50,000 tonnes of the 
foul-smelling waste - about one-third of what Toronto generates annually - 
in the first year of the contract. It will take 35,000 tonnes in each of the 
following two years, with an option to extend the contract for another two 
years if the company sets up a composting facility in Ontario.

"That they're able to help us out at this tonnage and for this long is 
great," , said Shelley Carroll, chair of the Toronto works committee.

Carroll said striking the deal is a major step in the city's frantic quest 
to find a place for the sludge before Aug. 1, the day a Michigan landfill 
stops accepting the city's 160, 000 tonnes annually, or 14 trucks a day, of 
sludge.

"It's really important for people to understand, that yes, we're driving 
another long distance... but we were really faced with an unworkable, very 
short-term deadline," she said.

"We continue to work on our long range solutions and really want to end up 
with a made-in Ontario solution."

Republic Services, which owns the Detroit-area landfill Carleton Farms, said 
in May it will stop taking sludge from all cities, including Toronto. That 
left the city 60 days to find new locations for the sticky, gooey substance.

Lawyers representing Toronto and Republic will be in court Wednesday arguing 
whether the landfill should help the city find a new site.

The city argues in the affidavit filed with the court that Republic has an 
obligation to find a place for Toronto's sludge at one of its other sites or 
else "dire and irreparable harm will occur" for Toronto.

Republic takes the position that there is no binding agreement with the city 
requiring the disposal of its sewage.

Carroll said the city will continue to pursue more options on this side of 
the border as it launches the legal action.

Negotiations are ongoing with the Green Lane landfill in London, Ont., to 
take some of the sludge. Terratec Environmental, which is under contract 
with the city to spread the treated sludge on agricultural fields, has been 
asked to aggressively pursue new sites.

"Staff have the directive and the authority to pursue every avenue to get us 
there, and this is one of them," said Carroll.

The contract with Environmental Management Solutions Inc. goes into effect 
at the beginning of August.

Most of the sludge generated by Toronto's 2.6 million residents will be 
composted at facilities in Quebec, however some will find its way into 
landfills in New York State, said Tony Busseri, president of EMS.

Busseri said the ban on sludge at Carleton Farms should be a warning for the 
provincial government - which has come under fire from opposition leaders 
and London's mayor for expanding the Green Lane landfill - that it needs to 
embrace sustainable, Ontario-based solutions.
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