Sludge Watch ==> Sewage sludge stinks up mine tailings at Sudbury Inco Falconbridge

[Maureen Reilly]

Sludgewatch Admin:

I have been asking around as to whose sludge is stinking up Lively.

Certainly Sudbury sewage sludge was sent to the Inco Falconbridge site.

But it looks like the City of Toronto sludge may also be adding its heady 
perfume to the mix.
Toronto's sludge is so so stinky it was banned from landfills in Michigan.  
So now the trucks drive 7 hours north...to Sudbury?  The City and the 
Ministry have not yet returned phone calls confirming just whose 
sludges...and how many city sludges .... are involved

http://www.toronto.ca/water/wastewater_treatment/treatment_plants/ashbridges/nlc/060601-71-minutes.pdf

http://www.grandsudbury.ca/pubapps/newsreleases/index.cfm?lang=en&Release_id=1352
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http://www.thesudburystar.com/webapp/sitepages/content.asp?contentid=568170&catname=Local+News&classif=

*
Foul odour plagues Lively*

*Denis St. Pierre  /  The Sudbury Star*
Local News - Wednesday, June 13, 2007 @ 09:00

Putrid, foul, sickening, noxious - take your pick. Those adjectives and more 
have been used by residents of the Lively and Copper Cliff areas to describe 
a familiar odour wafting over their neighbourhoods these days.

Call it what you want, but any way you look at it - or in this case smell it 
- it isn't pretty.

"It is absolutely putrid, absolutely foul," Lively resident Bonnie Brown 
says of the malodorous problem emanating from nearby CVRD-Inco mine tailings 
property.

The problem is not the mine tailings pond, per se. It's the fact the 
tailings area is used as the disposal site for sewage sludge - the solid 
waste produced by municipal sewage treatment plants.

Lively and Copper Cliff residents endured the sludge odour for years, 
particularly during hot, dry summer weather.



However, two years ago city officials informed residents that a permanent 
solution to the malodorous problem had been found.

In 2005, the city began mixing the sludge with a new chemical compound 
before dumping it into the tailings pond.

As hoped, the compound, known as Bioxide, has been effective in controlling 
odours from the tailings ponds, city officials say.

Unfortunately, the Bioxide product has not been able to address the problem 
that has cropped up recently and prompted Lively and Copper Cliff residents 
to complain to CVRD-Inco and city officials.

"We've received several complaints over the last few days," Greg Clausen, 
the city's acting general manager of infrastructure, acknowledged Tuesday. 
"We are working on the problem."

The sewage sludge problem is largely a municipal responsibility. CVRD-Inco 
is implicated only because it allows the city to dispose of the sludge in 
its tailings areas.

The sludge that has been treated with Bioxide for the last two years is not 
related to the current problem, Clausen said.

"The Bioxide is a permanent solution for the treatment of new sludge that 
goes in there," he said. "The problem that we believe is happening is in the 
older tailings area, that is no longer receiving water cover. Some of the 
fringe areas are starting to dry out and the sludge that was previously 
buried (underwater) is now exposed and starts to oxydize and that's what's 
creating the odours.

"So we think the odour is coming from old areas, not the ones where we've 
put down sludge for the last couple of years."

Currently, the city is applying lime to areas suspected to be causing the 
odour problem, Clausen said. Lime can be effective in controlling the sludge 
odour and the municipality will continue with that approach as it 
investigates the problem, he said.

"We are meeting Thursday with Inco and the people that provide the Bioxide 
product we are using, to further study the problem and see if we can 
collectively identify where it's coming from so we can appropriately treat 
it."

In the meantime, "there are areas we're treating with lime. If the odour 
goes away, then our conclusion is right and we'll have to come up with a 
permanent solution to address these areas."

A public meeting also will be scheduled soon to discuss the issue with area 
residents, Clausen said.