MECP CORRUPTION APPEARS CONSISTENT

 Why would I even think that the MECP were less corrupt in their dealings with other contaminated sites and polluters? Wishful thinking I guess. I have read many technical documents relating to other contaminated sites both in Waterloo Region and in Guelph. There are many similarities including wilful blindness and a stupidly naive reliance upon voluntary compliance. Examples include Ciba-Geigy,  Cnd. General Tower and Northstar Aerospace in Cambridge, Sunar and Canbar in Waterloo and IMICO in Guelph. 

I believe that the MECP's criteria in and of themselves are less than satisfactory. I believe that their political masters (provincial governments) have mandated them to avoid opening cans of worms as much as possible. In other words if you don't sample soils, groundwater, air on a maligned site than how can you possibly ever declare it contaminated? Getting back to their criteria they are premised on the wholly unrealistic and frankly naive assumption that pollution is an "accident" and that if a company reports a spill, it is the very first one ever no matter how many decades they've been operating there. Therefore the Min. of Environment (MECP) can confidently sample and if for example they only test for the "spilled" chemical they may get lucky and have a low concentration below the Ontario Drinking Water Standards.

Hence no big problem to report upstairs or to the neighbours. In Guelph the IMICO site has been empty since the 1980s. On the surface at least. Below ground however things are moving. Groundwater generally flows south-east in some aquifers and possibly south-west in others. There are multiple aquifers including several in the Bedrock of varying permeability and transmissivity. 

Apparently to this day there are still LNAPLS in the sub-surface. A prudent person (i.e. not the MECP etc.) might assume that with all the chlorinated solvents on site that there are also DNAPLS most likely firmly entrenched and embedded in the fractures in the close to surface Bedrock. All of this is horrible news yet the City of Guelph are more than ready to turn the site into affordable housing and parkland. Shame on everybody until the site is substantially cleaner than it is right now.

Quoting the late, great Pat Potter  "THEY ALL LIE".