Two examples are obvious and neither was in the public interest. Safety-Kleen were indemnified against additional contamination found behind Breslube in Breslau in order to get Safety-Kleen to buy the company. The problem was there was a lot of contamination between Breslube and the Grand River in both the soils and groundwater. It included LNAPLs (oils) floating on the surface of the groundwater as well as lots of solvents, some chlorinated. There were also PCBs mixed in with the floating LNAPLS. This contamination was serious enough to eventually shut down the two municipal wells close to the river known as K70 and K71 (K for Kitchener). Of course the Region has failed to come clean with the public about this.
The second example has to do with the sale of Varnicolor Chemical to Phillips Environmental who wanted to keep the company going as a solvent recycler. The Ministry of Environment had a Control Order insisting on a full aerial and VERTCIAL examination of sub-surface contamination. Gosh though Phillips were a little worried about the vertical examination and balked. Next thing you know that cleanup condition is gone. This was about 1993 or 94. Guess what? To this day there are still Varnicolor Chemical solvents deep in the Municipal aquifer underneath the site. The MOE gave Phillips an Indemnity that they didn't have to go looking for the deep contamination that eventually we found was indeed there.
Three bodies made separate deals with Uniroyal Chemical back in the 1990s allegedly for costs that they had incurred from Uniroyal's contamination. The Region of Waterloo may have gotten $40 million for their pipeline costs, lab costs etc. but it likely came with strings attached. Or maybe the $40 million was both costs and a bribe. Maybe it depends upon how you look at it. Regardless the Region backed off on DNAPL s just like the Township and the MOE. These last two also had their own agreements. We know that the MOE agreement was a sweetheart agreement that saved Uniroyal hundreds of millions of dollars in cleanup costs for both DNAPLs as well as "new" contamination found. In exchange for settling over the summer of 1991 the Ontario MOE were not publicly humiliated at the renewed Environmental Appeal Board hearings in the fall of 1991. In fact those hearings were shut down. The Township also settled for costs with Uniroyal but you can bet the farm that Uniroyal squeezed them but good probably in regards to "friendly" public consultation only.
This folks is how our governments deal behind our backs with corporate big shots flexing their financial muscles.
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