Sludge Watch ==> Ontario: Spill : 22-38, 000 litres of sewage sludge dumped from overturned truck

[Maureen Reilly]

Sludgewatch Admin:

The driver of this truck lost control and the truck ended up rolled over 
onto to its roof, as the 38,100 litres of liquid sewage sludge from 
Kitchener drained into an alfalfa field.

The Ministry of the Environment never attended the accident scene. No 
neighbours were notified to test their wells. The use of water on top of the 
spill is likely to have driven the liquid sewage contamination further down 
toward the aquifer.

As to the suggestion that they could 'vaccum up the sludge'...its 
impossible. The sludge went into the alfalfa field...and it couldn't be 
vacuumed after it soaked into the soil.  THe land owner was not notified by 
either the MOE nor the Health Unit.  It is not clear how the Ministry of the 
Environment can assess a spill without being present, and what criteria are 
used to determine clean up and neighbour notification requirements.

The Ministry says that the Health Unit is responsible to respond to health 
concerns. The Health Unit says it is the responsibility of the Ministry of 
the Environment to address those concerns.



The Health Unit is investigating.  Sound like Walkerton?

............................................................................


Sludge spill cleaned up


By Heather Rivers HEALTH REPORTER
Monday October 01, 2007

WOODSTOCK - An emergency cleanup crew spent several hours Saturday afternoon 
cleaning up after half a tanker of sludge leaked onto the side of the road 
when a tractor-trailer overturned.
The truck was en route to an Oxford County farmer’s field from a sewage 
plant in the Region of Waterloo, when it overturned at the intersection of 
Oxford Road 14 and Towerline Road.
Hank Van Veen, co-owner of Wessuc Inc., the biosolids management company 
that owns the truck, said he was grateful the driver was uninjured.
"It’s a very unfortunate thing," he said. "but I’m happy the driver’ is not 
injured. That’s the main thing."

Van Veen said about 20 to 22 cubic metres of sludge was released during the 
spill.
Van Veen, who described the load as "non-toxic," said sludge is regularly 
spread on farmer’s fields in a "recycling program" that provides the fields 
with macro and micro nutrients.
As part of the cleanup, workers vacuumed the spilt sludge and pressure 
washed the remainder.
"There should be no negative impact," he said. "The nitrogen absorbs into 
the soil and the phosphates bind with the soil. However, the high pressure 
washing will remove some of the top soil."
But Maureen Reilly, of the environmental group Sludge Watch, said sludge 
spills pose risks of contamination to both crops, groundwater and wells.
"How do you clean it up? It’s already moved into soil," she said. "This is a 
serious thing - it holds masses of diseases, pathogenic bacteria, pathogenic 
cysts, chemical and nitrates."

http://woodstocksentinelreview.com/News/342427.html