Canadians foul Pacific

I can't believe Canada continues to dump raw sewage into a water way such as the Puget Sound.
http://www.oregonlive.com/travel/index. ... cart_river

Mike in O wrote:I can't believe Canada continues to dump raw sewage into a water way such as the Puget Sound.
http://www.oregonlive.com/travel/index. ... cart_river

Not Canada - the city of Victoria.

Not good, no argument, but "I can't believe the US continues to ... etc" 
http://www.newsweek.com/it-raining-nycs-raw-sewage-probably-pouring-waterways-260784

There is a lot of cleaning up needed all over the world

Since this problem effects the US side of the border, it is a federal problem for Canada. Victoria obviously doesn't see any problem with dumping raw sewage into a closed waterway, claiming the tides move the sewage which may have worked when Victoria was a small backwater city. It is major city now. Different from the story claiming it is the last major city on the continent doesn't take into account of Mexico. San Diego faced the same problem of a city not wanting to waste money (pun intended) on the environment with the 3rd world city of Tijuana. Some sewage now is moving into the San Diego system (not the best)because of Mexico and US federally got involved. I don't think Victoria thinks of themselves as 3rd world and should be clamoring for Ottawa to take the lead to develop a sewage system.

I agree with your concern but my understanding is that this sort of responsibility is the usual turf-war between levels of government and the system would look to the city to sort it out, or at best the province, rather than the feds getting involved. There are actually rather few national standards for anything here in Canada with each province, and in some cases city, expected to work out appropriate standards for their local circumstances because one size is not expected to fit all..

Quote:  "Canada faces a variety of provincial and territorial approaches (to wastewater and biosolids) that are not consistent with federal legislation, and we have no structure to have a rational science-based discussion of the policies and regulatory requirements that would enable us to identify and promote the beneficial use of these environmental resources."
T. Duncan Ellison, Executive Director, Canadian Water and Wastewater Association

Meanwhile, Canada is by no means alone in this. By no means.

I think there are several cities that do this in Canada and the world. "Dilution is the source to pollution" as a philosophy only works for so long.

I live in Victoria which includes over a dozen municipalities.  The information the writer came up with may be a bit out of date, or rather will be as a waste water treatment plant is currently being worked on.

Having said that, there is still considerable misinformation (disinformation?) being thrown about in numerous places.

It's a very complex issue, and one can't possibly get into the whole issue on an internet forum, however suffice it to say that the whole issue has been driven by emotions rather than hard science (I've been following it closely for 24 years).  When one throws in several levels of politicians and few zealous writers (NPS issue again), you have at best a pig's lunch.

The hard science (based on actual testing of water quality) does not support a treatment plant.  However it will go ahead in spite of this; it's just a matter of time.

In inland waters, it is the nutrients that are most problematic (not so in the ocean).  In an ocean, the nutrient discharge from even a large city like Seattle WA into the Pacific Ocean would be like a single drop into a 1,000,000 gallon tank - detectable but meaningless.

The Fraser River is the second largest river in the Pacific Northwest (the Columbia being the largest), and it discharges into salt water at Vancouver.   Then it flows through the Strait of Juan da Fuca and immediately along the south-west edge of Vancouver Island (where Victoria is located), into the Pacific Ocean.  In frequent tests by the medical health officer of Victoria, virtually no pathogens have been found in the samples on any of the beaches.  In fact, this medical health officer (an M.D.) has written editorials in the local newspaper decrying the expenditure for something that will achieve nothing but cost and window dressing so people can feel we aren't polluting the Earth.

What concerns me far more about the Earth's oceans is acidification which has been linked to the burning of hydrocarbons.  This is by far the largest threat to the Earth's oceans; anyone on this forum that subscribes to National Geographic may recall the feature issue a while back about the topic of ocean acidification.  Now that is a threat worth worrying about.

The problem with the sewage issue is that no one can bring forth any scientific evidence that it is an issue - it's been based entirely on emotions and perceptions.



Glenn

Glenn NK wrote:I live in Victoria which includes over a dozen municipalities.  The information the writer came up with may be a bit out of date, or rather will be as a waste water treatment plant is currently being worked on.

Having said that, there is still considerable misinformation (disinformation?) being thrown about in numerous places.

It's a very complex issue, and one can't possibly get into the whole issue on an internet forum, however suffice it to say that the whole issue has been driven by emotions rather than hard science (I've been following it closely for 24 years).  When one throws in several levels of politicians and few zealous writers (NPS issue again), you have at best a pig's lunch.

The hard science (based on actual testing of water quality) does not support a treatment plant.  However it will go ahead in spite of this; it's just a matter of time.

In inland waters, it is the nutrients that are most problematic (not so in the ocean).  In an ocean, the nutrient discharge from even a large city like Seattle WA into the Pacific Ocean would be like a single drop into a 1,000,000 gallon tank - detectable but meaningless.

The Fraser River is the second largest river in the Pacific Northwest (the Columbia being the largest), and it discharges into salt water at Vancouver.   Then it flows through the Strait of Juan da Fuca and immediately along the south-west edge of Vancouver Island (where Victoria is located), into the Pacific Ocean.  In frequent tests by the medical health officer of Victoria, virtually no pathogens have been found in the samples on any of the beaches.  In fact, this medical health officer (an M.D.) has written editorials in the local newspaper decrying the expenditure for something that will achieve nothing but cost and window dressing so people can feel we aren't polluting the Earth.

What concerns me far more about the Earth's oceans is acidification which has been linked to the burning of hydrocarbons.  This is by far the largest threat to the Earth's oceans; anyone on this forum that subscribes to National Geographic may recall the feature issue a while back about the topic of ocean acidification.  Now that is a threat worth worrying about.

The problem with the sewage issue is that no one can bring forth any scientific evidence that it is an issue - it's been based entirely on emotions and perceptions.



Glenn

Are you saying that dumping raw sewage into the ocean is fine then???

Glenn NK wrote:I live in Victoria which includes over a dozen municipalities.  The information the writer came up with may be a bit out of date, or rather will be as a waste water treatment plant is currently being worked on.

Having said that, there is still considerable misinformation (disinformation?) being thrown about in numerous places.

It's a very complex issue, and one can't possibly get into the whole issue on an internet forum, however suffice it to say that the whole issue has been driven by emotions rather than hard science (I've been following it closely for 24 years).  When one throws in several levels of politicians and few zealous writers (NPS issue again), you have at best a pig's lunch.

The hard science (based on actual testing of water quality) does not support a treatment plant.  However it will go ahead in spite of this; it's just a matter of time.

In inland waters, it is the nutrients that are most problematic (not so in the ocean).  In an ocean, the nutrient discharge from even a large city like Seattle WA into the Pacific Ocean would be like a single drop into a 1,000,000 gallon tank - detectable but meaningless.

The Fraser River is the second largest river in the Pacific Northwest (the Columbia being the largest), and it discharges into salt water at Vancouver.   Then it flows through the Strait of Juan da Fuca and immediately along the south-west edge of Vancouver Island (where Victoria is located), into the Pacific Ocean.  In frequent tests by the medical health officer of Victoria, virtually no pathogens have been found in the samples on any of the beaches.  In fact, this medical health officer (an M.D.) has written editorials in the local newspaper decrying the expenditure for something that will achieve nothing but cost and window dressing so people can feel we aren't polluting the Earth.

What concerns me far more about the Earth's oceans is acidification which has been linked to the burning of hydrocarbons.  This is by far the largest threat to the Earth's oceans; anyone on this forum that subscribes to National Geographic may recall the feature issue a while back about the topic of ocean acidification.  Now that is a threat worth worrying about.

The problem with the sewage issue is that no one can bring forth any scientific evidence that it is an issue - it's been based entirely on emotions and perceptions.



Glenn

I am glad that is settled...are you ready to defend BC logging practices and extraction industries now?  Those that live in glass houses (United States) have a lot of explaining to do to defend their bad practices, defending the indefensible, I will not do.