CHEMTURA/M.O.E. WILLING TO COVERUP DIOXINS & AGENT ORANGE

There are two types of coverup. One is referred to as "capping" and simply means putting some sort of barrier over top of wastes and contaminated soil. The other is your more typical coverup, whereby through deceptive means one trys to hide a scandal. In this case on Chemtura's Elmira site, both are involved. Yesterday's Elmira Independent carried this story "Committee opposes partial excavation of waste pits". It is referring to GP1 and GP2 on the south-east corner of Chemtura. They are former gravel pits where liquid wastes from the east side pits were allowed and even encouraged to overflow and gravity drain towards them and then settle into the ground. These liquid wastes included solvents, pesticides, Dioxins and literally all Uniroyal wastes.

The Ministry of the Environment claim that there is no evidence that Agent Orange (Dioxin), DDT and more is leaving Chemtura's site from this area. As long as the M.O.E. continue to wear mittens, blindfolds and ear muffs they can continue along that track. The reality is that area is all part of the Upper Aquifer as well as being floodplain for the Canagagigue Creek. Leakage, groundwater and surface water flow have been going on forever and indeed are counted on by Chemtura and co-conspirators to reduce their on-site quantities of toxic wastes.

During a trenching operation buried drums were discovered years ago in Chemtura's south-west corner and removed last summer. Composite soil samples were taken in order to characterize the level of contamination. Besides dark soil there were also tarry globs found. These tarry globs as admitted by Conestoga Rovers could have been from the days of Uniroyal cleaning out their two on-site tar pits (TPW1, TPW2) and depositing them in the town dump now owned by Chemtura and called M2. Based on past history dealing with both DNAPLS (dense non-aqueous phase liquids) and Dioxins, these tarry globs should have been tested and chemically identified. They were not which is bad enough but it gets worse when Councillor and CPAC member, Mark Bauman, suggests that it wasn't necessary. Really? Does the five minute man have knowlege, past or present, that the rest of us don't? Hardly. Mark is sending out strong signals to Chemtura and the M.O.E. that he is reasonable and flexible. In other words he is politiking first instead of putting Woolwich citizens first. Smarten up Mark or you will continue to read about it here and you won't like it.

The next CPAC meeting is March 28/13 at 6 pm. in the Woolwich Council Chambers.

MORE DETAILS REGARDING REGION'S "MANAGEMENT" OF CAMBRIDGE DRINKING WATER

I have now drawn up a chart with approximately 26 Cambridge wells down the left side and the years from 2003 to 2012 across the top. At present I have the chart filled in for the last five years plus. What I am filling in is the number of weeks the particular well is offline during the year as well as whether the monitoring data presented is for the current year or not. The results are worrisome.

First off let me say that the Region of Waterloo may or may not be abiding by the letter of the Ontario Safe Water Drinking Act but they absolutely are not abiding by the spirit of it. Specific chemicals that were being tested for a decade ago plus and being detected in Cambridge wells are no longer being reported in the Annual Reports. This would include Dioxins, 1,1,1 TCA, NDMA, Toluene, Ethyl Benzene etc. Glyphosate which was detected years ago in well H3 (Hespeler) has had its' Method Detection Limit (MDL) dramatically raised from 2 ppb. to 25 ppb. thus guaranteeing it will not be reported again.

There are complete years of monitoring results missing from wells that are currently in use for drinking. This would include all three Hespeler wells and wells located near Ciba-Geigy (Novartis). Similarily wells located near Northstar Aerospace and Allen-Bradley as well as those further south of Ciba-Geigy are missing years of monitoring data. What seems fairly clear is that wells that have been shut down for substantial time frames do not have their routine monitoring done for a year or two or three or even for four years afterwards.

Over time the "problem" wells become obvious. For example all three wells in Hespeler have been alternately shut down for periods between one and two years. Past local manufacturers have included American Standard as well as Inglis. It seems obvious that they or others have "enriched" the groundwater which is still being used for drinking . Just over a decade ago Dioxins were found in two of their three wells. Back when Ciba-Geigy was found to have contaminated the ground with allegedly only Dinoseb, the Region and M.O.E. claimed that the contamination could never get to the deeper drinking water aquifers. That was horse manure and numerous drinking wells have since had low detections of solvents and herbicides including metalachlor. Further south wells G38 and G39 were shut down and locked out in 2006 and stayed off for two to three years. They are back in use now as well.

I suggested earlier that shut down wells weren't being monitored regularily. A more accurate comment would probably be that the Region are monitoring them but simply not reporting the results in the Annual Reports. It would be similar to car manufacturers recalling cars for mechanical faults but refusing to tell the public what they were. This deception is uncalled for and needs to be drastically improved.

IS THE REGION PLAYING GAMES WITH CAMBRIDGE'S DRINKING WATER ?

Oh boy, this could be playing with fire! Therefore let me state that the following posting is my opinion. It is not based upon idle speculation however; it is based upon a serious and ongoing study of the Region of Waterloo's Annual Drinking Water Reports. I've been trying to look at the big picture over a number of years and I am finding some very strange drinking well shutdowns as well as occasional detections of industrial chemicals in them. These detections of industrial chemicals are not too surprisingly related to nearby industries whether Cnd. General Tower, Ciba-Geigy (Novartis), Allen Bradley, Northstar Aerospace as well as the Cambridge Landfill. Keep also in mind two terms namely Interceptor Wells and Pumping to Waste. These terms are connected in that an Interceptor Well is situated between drinking wells and a point source of contamination. The idea is to intercept contaminated water before it reaches the drinking wells. The drinking wells therefore primarily are pumping cleaner groundwater that is outside the cone of influence of the Interceptor Well. These Interceptor Wells therefore need to discharge their water somewhere. It can be onto the surface, into storm water sewers and hence a nearby creek or even into the sanitary sewers for treatment at the local sewage treatment plant. Hence the term pumping to waste.

It is quite possible to have an Interceptor Well also doing double duty as a Drinking Well. Here however is where things get tricky and complicated. By the way everything I am surmising here is absolutely contrary to the Justic O'Connor Report on the Walkerton tragedy. Justic O'Connor emphasized a multiple barrier approach to drinking water safety. In other words from the original source of water, surface or groundwater, to the treatment and distribution; the water should constantly be monitored at all points and any problems or issues needed to be isolated and removed from the system immediately. In other words a single world class treatment system for example is not a multi barrier approach. One failure whether mechanical or chemical at the treatment plant and contaminated water is into the distribution system. Ideally the source water is safe and clean and proven to be so, and continues throughout multiple stages with testing ongoing. Similarily the distribution system piping also needs to be continuously monitored.

What I believe I am seeing in Cambridge is multiple sources of contaminated water being "managed" via the use of many nearby pumping/drinking wells. As nearby wells are pumped they draw the contaminated water towards them until the plume has reached the well. Then after an adverse reading that well is either shut down allowing the plume to shift in direction or the well merely goes "offline" for weeks, months or years. By "offline" it means that the well piping is disconnected from the distribution and or treatment system. Again the well is free to pump to waste or into sewers etc.. When one looks at wells nearby to the above mentioned contaminated sites a pattern appears to emerge. I am the first to admit that this is not immediately obvious for many reasons. Most Cambridge residents have absolutely no idea which wells by name are located where. The Annual Reports certainly are not very helpful in that regard. Also most citizens do not know which chemicals have been found in the nearby groundwater of these various past polluters. Finally most citizens also don't know in detail the extent of cleanups done or the long term charteristics of specific industrial chemicals leaked or discharged into the natural environment.

If I am correct, even partially, in what I believe I am seeing, then the Region of Waterloo have some serious explaining to do. Perhaps the Region are actually on to some kind of incredibly complicated but possible long term contaminated groundwater management system here. Regardless I believe they owe the public the whole truth, not a varnished one. They and the Ontario M.O.E. generally try and minimize the extent of industrial pollution by routinely suggesting that the drinking wells are safe and protected whether by geological formations, depth to wellscreens etc.. My experience has been that once solvents and other industrial chemicals are into the shallow aquifers they keep spreading both vertically and horizantly. I'm beginning to suspect that the Region will be bragging about their tap water right up until the day they have the Lake Erie pipeline completed. Then suddenly they will advise the public that golly gee things aren't quite as rosy as we thought they were.

ANOTHER DRINKING WELL SHUT DOWN BY INDUSTRIAL POLLUTION IN WATERLOO REGION

As usual it was done quietly and without fanfare. I had predicted the eventual shutdown of this well due to Trichloroethylene contamination for some time now. Only somewhat surprisingly is the fact that other wells in Cambridge with consistently high TCE readings are still used on a daily basis. These of course are the Middleton Wellfield wells. Similarily the William St. wells in Waterloo have had TCE in them for decades. The significance is that those are both major wellfields with multiple wells involved. The Middleton wellfield is diluted via both well G15 several hundred yards to the south as well as by a massive aquifer flowing from the west. Despite this, last year the concentrations from the wells rose on occasion to between 3.0 and 3.3 parts per billion (ppb). While this is below the Ontario drinking water standard of 5.0 ppb it is higher than a number of U.S. jurisdictions.

Well P6 in the Dumphries Conservation Area has been on life support for some time now. Nearby well P7 has been shut down for a very long time which gives me suspicion that our authorities may have known of a local source of TCE long before the Northstar/Bishop St. tragedy became public. To the credit of the Region of Waterloo they haven't had their head in the sand in regards to P6. If this amateur hydrogeologist, after reading dozens of hydrogeological reports could figure out that P6 was doomed, then so could they. In fact P6 was the only individual well in Waterloo Region that was being tested for TCE multiple times per year. Yes the Middleton and the William St. wellfields are also but they are multiple wells with proven and consistent TCE concentrations found. As of last year P6 was below .5 ppb according to the Region's Annual Drinking Water Report. This year's 2012 Annual Report which just went on line a couple of weeks back states that well P6 "was offline for all of 2012". Hence there are zero readings given to the public for well P6 in 2012.

One tidbit of good news for Cambridge tap water drinkers. These reports which the Region produces annually due to provincial legislation are just that namely Annual Drinking Water Reports. Therefore in theory any breakthroughs of plumes to drinking wells should be caught relatively early. Indeed Middleton is tested each year for many industrial chemicals as well as bacteria. The same cannot be said for numerous other Cambridge wells. I'm in the middle of going through these dozens of reports but I've already found numerous "Annual" Reports which simply have last year's (2011) data in them. I'm not sure what is going on here but will continue to investigate.

Consumers of tap water in the northern end of the Region (Elmira & St.Jacobs) should also be concerned. While a few of us are still fighting desperately against apathy, governments, industry (Chemtura) and the M.O.E. to restore our local wells; the populace have all been reassurred that in the interim we're drinking sparkling City of Waterloo water via pipeline. The two major wellfields namely William St. wells and the Erb St. wells have significant problems. Not only do the William St. wells have TCE in them but three of the four were shut down from the whole year (W3) to four and thirteen weeks respectively (W1C, W1B). Two of the Erb St wells were shut down for major time frames (23 & 11 weeks) plus individual well W10 was shut down for the entire year.

Amazing isn't it how politicians respond to money, power, influence and donations to their political campaigns. Their response is primarily protection of the guilty.

ELMIRA & ST. JACOBS TAP WATER

Following is part of the reason why I would eventually like to see our drinking water in Elmira and St. Jacobs come from our own local sources. Each year the Region of Waterloo put out a Public Notice titled Water Supply Notice. This year's report came out a couple of weeks ago and is based on testing done throughout 2012. While the Region apparently comply with province of Ontario (Ministry of the Environment) guidelines, quite frankly that doesn't mean much. There is an astounding list of industrial chemicals that are not included, some of which are quite common if not ubiquitous in our groundwater. This may well be why they aren't included in the first place. Also each year there are unexplained long term shutdowns of supply wells which is very disconcerting. These wells have been in production for decades and it sure isn't as if our summers are getting wetter and our population smaller, hence the huge question is why are these wells being shut down .

This information is on the Region of Waterloo's website and is accessed under "About the Environment", Quality & Treatment. Our local water comes via pipeline from the City of Waterloo and was installed in the very early 90's when the two Elmira wellfields were shut down due to NDMA and so much more. There are many groundwater wells pumping into either the William St. System or the Erb St. System. Both of these systems have wells that were shut down for extended periods of time. In the case of the Erb St System there does seem to be some sort of change underway in their pipng systems which I will look into further. In the case of the William St. System there are four wells named W1B, W1C, W2 and W3. "*Well W1B was offline for 13 weeks in 2012. W1C was offline for 4 weeks in 2012. Well W2 was offline for 2 weeks in 2012. Well W3 was offline for all of 2012.". I would be very interested in seeing some documentation about these longer term shutdowns. For example a one or two week shutdown could possibly be chalked up to routine annual maintenance, pump repairs, cleaning etc.

The piece de resistance is the joys of neverending trichloroethylene in the groundwater. This TCE is the long term result of a number of now defunct manufacturing industries immediately west of downtown King St. in Waterloo. There are levels of TCE at just below 1/2 the drinking water standard of 5 parts per billion (ppb). This Ontario drinking water standard is considered unacceptably high in a number of U.S. jurisdictions who prefer 1.5 to 3 ppb. What I can't determine but suspect is that these levels in the 2.0 ppb. range are probably the result of mixing and diluting within the four supply wells. At the same time if these wells are close enough together then all four are probably contaminated although different depths of wellscreens could certainly alter the concentrations. This is the water locals have been drinking for decades from the William St. wellfield. Elmira and St. Jacobs to date have only been drinking it since as stated the early 90's. I will be following up with further examination of these wells and others in the 2012 Annual Water Quality Report.

MORE ON LAST THURSDAY'S CPAC MEETING

First of all there was less tension in the room than in the previous month. I expect this had to do with CPAC & SWAT members knowing that *RC verification was a done deal. Not much point in continuing to beat a dead horse. Similarily Chemtura personnel seemed much calmer, more relaxed and less defensive than usual.

I went first with the Delegations and was pleased to actually have four people ask me questions afterwards. All questions were relevant and worthwhile and included Sebastian and Mark from CPAC, Jeff M. from Chemtura and George Karlos from the Ministry of the Environment.

Councillor Mark Bauman of CPAC did his politician's best of trying to appease everybody. Nevertheless he did make one wonderful statement to the fact that the M.O.E. accept Conestoga Rovers reports at face value. Mark also gently prodded Chemtura to pony up money to pay for peer reviews of their technical reports done by Conestoga Rovers (CRA).

Again CPAC members by asking followup questions were able to clarify that despite Jeff Merriman's original comments about empty drums and "rusty remnants" as well as non detect levels of soil contamination; that indeed chemical wastes were found and removed. These wastes were black, tarry globs. Steve Quigley of CRA also added to the overall knowledge by advising CPAC that Chemtura's former tarpits (TPW1 & TPW2) were excavated when full in the past and deposited within the former municipal landfill (M2) which they now own. Susanna, the latest addition to the SWAT team combined with Sebastian did a bit of a back and forth questioning of Chemtura as to the comparison in excavation depths for GP1 & GP2 on the east side (1 metre) versus the 1-3 metre excavation on the west side (M2) to remove drums and waste materials.

We were advised by George Karlos of the M.O.E. that the downstream monitoring in the Canagagigue was complete and the report should be coming to CPAC prior to its' public presentation at CPAC. Personally due to the lack of a presented work plan up front, I am doubtful that the M.O.E. obtained information that can be clearly compared with past information. For example which parameters, which locations, what depths etc.. Regardless I'm always interested in new data and will see what can be determined from this latest effort.

SKULDUGGERY TRIUMPHS AS CHEMTURA RECEIVES *RESPONSIBLE CARE VERIFICATION

Well at the very least Chemtura had the decency to be low key and quiet last evening when they announced they had received their *RC verification, albeit with one dissenting opinion. To say that their verifcation is tainted is a huge understatement. The lone dissenting opinion, in writing, was submitted by Dr. Dan Holt, Chair of the Woolwich Township appointed Chemtura Public Advisory Committee (CPAC). CPAC had made their position very clear a month ago at the January public CPAC meeting that Chemtura absolutely did not deserve to receive *RC verification based upon multiple failures on their part. As stated earlier Chemtura's West Hill facility was represented on the verification team as was CPAC with one solitary vote out of six. That vote was negative ie. incomplete for Chemtura.

This verification as also expressed earlier was a Do Over. The decision had been made early last December and it was appropriately negative based upon the negative vote of Dr. Dan (and CPAC). When Dr. Dan advised Woolwich Council of what he clearly understood was the team's decision, Chemtura went all postal on him. Unknown to Dr. Dan, Chemtura and the Chemical Industry Assoc'n of Canada (CIAC) were already discussing the Do Over.

As early as July 2011 I knew that the fix was in. When I found out that the current CPAC had but one vote and former CPAC Chair Pat McLean had been appointed to the verification team, I knew she was there by Chemtura's choice. Indeed when the chips were down Pat delivered in favour of Chemtura. This is completely in line with my opinions expressed here over the last couple of years and absolutely no surprise whatsoever. What is even more incredible to me is that as rigged as the verification team was, Chemtura and CIAC have advised us that other companies don't even use the pretence of going through community groups. In other words other companies appoint unilaterally their CAPs (citizen advisory panels) and then use them as their verification team. Finally as I also expressed here in the Advocate on January 29/13, Gail Martin's Editorial in the Elmira Independent was dead wrong. Gail claimed that Pat's vote would not change anything. Rubbish! Pat's vote was the deciding vote. If the two local residents and representatives (Dr. Dan & Pat) had voted negative the verification team would have been committing suicide by approving verification. As badly tainted as the decision already is, can you imagine the public disgust and contempt when they found out that our local ongoing polluter had received *RC verifcation contrary to both local reps?

There were three Delegates to last evening's CPAC meeting including myself, Richard Clausi and Councillor Mark Bauman. Richard made it clear that he had figured out the verification decision some time ago based upon the written comments of Bob Masterson of the CIAC. So much for Chemtura's paranoia around confidentiality. Yours truly in Table form showed the extent of the below computer modelled target pumping throughout the Elmira Aquifers over the last fourteen plus years.

Sebastian of CPAC dug into the recent excavations of old drums on the Chemtura site in the former M2 landfill. It took a little prodding but low and behold chemical wastes in the form of black tars were found and removed along with drum carcasses. These tars were not analysed for their chemical composition.

Yours truly as promised in yesterday's Advocate asked Chemtura to clarify the difference between statistically significant increases in chemicals in the Canagagigue Creek as it flows through Chemtura versus arithmetic means which for me appear more accurate and straightforward. Jeff Merriman of Chemtura has promised to so clarify at the next CPAC meeting on March 28/13.

More will be posted about last evening's CPAC meeting including the contributions of numerous CPAC and SWAT team members.