SOME GOOD NEWS O.K. WITH A DASH OF REALITY AS WELL

I am starting to get the impression that the MOE are doing some pushing of Lanxess and their good buddies GHD. The other good news is that citizens, with an enormous amount of time and effort, can affect the direction of investigations, and eventual cleanup. This is despite our local council being in bed with the polluter even to the extreme of picking and choosing public consultation members based upon the polluter (Chemtura/Lanxess) having the hammer (veto).

I received last Friday a copy of a November 6, 2018 response to the MOE (MECP) from GHD, Lanxess's consultants. GHD are proposing to install from four to eight wells depending upon finding the Municipal Upper Aquifer along the laneway that enters the Stroh farm up on Highway #86 (Elmira to Guelph highway). If they can't find the MU Aquifer then it will be only four shallow wells. They are doing this because of the MOE's insistence on a better groundwater investigation of the Stroh property just to the east of the Uniroyal/Lanxess property. Keep in mind that all of the investigations since 2015 on the east side of Chemtura/Lanxess are a direct result of the 2011-2015 CPAC and SWAT which includes yours truly. We opened the can of worms that the MOE, Uniroyal and CRA had kept carefully hidden for three decades or more.

Now for the dash of reality known as the elephant in the room. The "Gap" has NOT been delineated, examined or investigated even remotely properly and by intention. Similarly neither has the Stroh Drain. This secret, man made Drain has effectively drained both surface and groundwater from both the Stroh and Uniroyal properties for decades. Much of that drainage would have been contaminated with persistent organic pollutants (POPs) either attached to soil particles and or dissolved in solvent contaminated groundwater. The fact that solvents and NDMA have been found still at high concentrations on the east side property is both sobering and scary. How much of the Persistent Organic Pollutants such as dioxins, DDT and PCBs are still in and around the Stroh Drain we do not know until a serious search is undertaken.